Knights of Alchemy
by Feonyx
Summary: Chapter thirteen, concerning narrow-minded shamans (or shamen, if you're Meg) and a fight unlike any the Knights have so far had to face, though there's still always the chance that they'll be found out and die. Oh, for the knightly life.
1. Stormclouds

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter One: Stormclouds**

                It was raining outside the Hall of Ankohl, a mighty storm in the night that made the dryness and torchlight inside seem even more inviting.  Though this was a place of decisions, the political centre of the Eastern Sea -aside from Lemuria, which ruled itself- it was also a place of social gathering, where many of the villagers met at the end of a day.  And the food wasn't bad, either.

                Straining to hear past the background noise of a few dozen voices, Harbromme leaned over in his chair at the farthest end of the long hall, towards the Elder Torph, who was explaining a rather longwinded opinion of the economic situation with Lemuria.  Apparently they were refusing to allow merchant ships with the letter 'I' in their names to dock, or something like that.  

There was always a problem with the Lemurians.  Sometimes Harbromme thought the Lemurians were difficult just to enjoy the results on Torph.  If he didn't have to spend so much time dealing with the man, Harbromme would probably do it himself, sometimes.  The way the old man's face tightened until his wrinkles vanished and the sides of his head went red suggested that if pushed too far, he might very literally explode one day.

"Look, this is ridiculous," Weychuk said to the nearly-deaf (and thus nearly-asleep) elder to his left.  "Either we stop letting them in or we impose some limits on the noise in here.  I can barely understand myself."  The dozing elder looked over at Weychuk in a calculating way.

"What?" he asked at last.

"We cannot simply allow them to make arbitrary legislation like this!  I don't care if they're receiving orders from the Elemental Spirits in their sleep, the Lemurians are going to start being reasonable.  I want an envoy to head down there and tell them if they don't work things out _with_ our people, then we'll find other nations to do business with!" continued Torph, who tended to work through these rants in a matter of a hours.  Until then, there was little to do but weather the storm, much like the village was weathering the one outside.  A bolt of lightning seemed to indicate Jupiter's agreement, though Harbromme knew better than to believe a Spirit might choose to hear his thoughts at that moment.

"If he doesn't shut up soon I'm going to cast Briar under his chair," Weychuk commented quietly.  "Don't we have someone else to deal with the Lemurians?"

"After all these years, everyone else thinks the job is hell," Harbromme pointed out.

"They're right, but we're not talking about what the Lemurians are putting up with, we're talking about replacing _our_ side."  Harbromme laughed, and decided that life was too good to even want to replace Torph, who had more energy than anyone else even close to his age.  Admittedly, the source of that energy was unbridled fury, but whatever worked, worked.

Ankohl Province, in this age of Weyard, was perhaps the most prosperous place to live on the entire Eastern Sea.  Lemuria, of course, was off that scale, an island where Psynergy was treated not so much as a skill to be mastered as it was sort of supreme arm and life lasted for many centuries, thanks to the strange powers of the spring water.

But Ankohl was a beautiful place, nestled between the Lamakan Mountains and the Great Eastern Sea, where people could do or be anything they wanted, whether they felt at home among trees, in mines, or on the waves.  And it had a share of luxury, too, thanks to trade with all the other lands on the ocean.

And so there was little for Harbromme to do on this stormy summer night except bask in the warmth of both the fire and the gathered villagers, a haven in from the cold rain.  There were no threats in these days, except occasional monsters out of the mountains.  The world of Weyard was at peace.

The slamming of the doors at the far end of the hall could be called symbolic by one who knew what was happening, one who could see all that would now happen.  The crash piercing the calm of the Hall was like the shattering of the peace, and soon it would echo in every town across the world.

"Elders!" shouted the dripping man, who had sprinted through the storm without notice and was now barrelling down the centre aisle between the tables and chairs.  "Elders!" he repeated, stumbling to a halt in front of Harbromme and the others.  "The Trident is gone from the sanctum!  It has been stolen!"

A collective cry went up from the villagers, ranging from horrified shrieks to shouts of anger that anyone would dare to steal the sacred relic.  Thieves were uncommon in Ankohl Province, though they were unavoidable in many other parts of the world.  To think that one would dare come into their capital and steal the hallowed Trident of Ankohl!

"When was it found, or rather, _not found missing?" asked Harbromme, cutting off Torph, who would have been more likely to shout 'Mobilize the soldiers!'  The theft of an important symbol like the Trident could create a panic, which was what Harbromme intended to avoid above all else._

"Not half an hour ago, Elder Harbromme!" replied the stricken man.  "It was-"  

Harbromme cut him off with a raised hand and looked around the room.  "Will all the Jupiter Adepts please assist the temple monks with their searching.  Everyone else, remain calm.  This is not a crisis.  A thief from another land, no doubt, has underestimated the powers of the people of Ankohl.  The Trident will be returned safely."

"You sound confident," muttered Torph as about a quarter of the villagers rose and made their way, reluctantly, out into the storm.

"Would you prefer chaos?" asked Weychuk, who was always ready to defend someone, as long as that someone in front wasn't himself.

"I think that we could be underestimating the thief- as much as he is underestimating us," Torph finished his sentence with a glare at Harbromme.  The Elder shook it off.  Torph only seemed to be happy when he _wasn't_ happy, and it was nothing to worry about.  Ankohl would not be harmed by these events.

Outside, Jastyx could nearly hear Harbromme's thoughts as easily as a Jupiter Adept.  "Don't be so certain of that, dear foolish Elder."  And another shadow slipped into the night and the storm.

Cata decided, as she hauled another bucket of water from the well, that this was _it_.  She could not take this any more, and if nothing else, Elys was going to hear about it, even if she did no more.  Carrying around water and feeding animals and doing endless chores was _not what Cata intended, and there wasn't much else to do in Daila._

The village was larger now, filling the northern valleys for a few miles to the north, east, and west.  The fields were dark with fertile soil, and no doubt it would be an excellent season for the people of Daila.  They supplied most of the countries on the Great Eastern Sea with food, and was quite prosperous for such a simple village.  The people here put their souls into the earth, and they reaped the rewards along with the plants.  Well, that was fine, but that didn't mean it was for everyone.

Cata put the buckets down by the back door, shook her head in an attempt to get her long, rippling hair out of her face, and stormed off toward the house where her best friend lived, though there was a fair chance Elys was still asleep at this hour.  She had enough older brothers that there wasn't much for her to do until an hour or two past sunrise, which was practically noon to most farmers.

The house was short and unremarkable, a description that held true for all of Daila's buildings.  It was wooden, thatch-roofed, and mostly quite sturdy, though winter wasn't often cold in the north of Indra, and some of the boards in the outer walls were slightly spaced to let air in.

The door was open, and Elys' mother didn't look twice when Cata entered the kitchen and headed through to her daughter's room.  They exchanged 'good morning's in passing, and each got on with their work.

"Elys, you lazy Mercury-aligned lunk!" said Cata by way of greeting.  "Are you dead, or did someone fill that blanket with lead while you were asleep?  It's not like they'd be short of time!"

"You're cheerful this morning," Elys mumbled, absolutely serious.  Cata teased just about everyone, and was always careful not to go past anyone's limit.  Well, not too far.

"I've had it," Cata declared, hurling the blanket aside with a very minor Whirlwind.

"It can't even be eight yet," Elys protested, rising to a sitting position.

"I mean I've had it with this village," the Jupiter Adept replied, and another burst of wind opened the shutters on Elys' window.  "I can't take this sort of life any more."

"I'm not sure what you expect me to do about it.  The axe needs sharpening," Elys said with a yawn, and rubbed her eyes.

"I'm serious, Elys," Cata repeated.  "You know how it's going to go for me.  You, too."

"I just woke up.  Remind again what fate has in store for us, oh oracle of the ages," asked Elys, and grinned.  Cata scowled at her, mostly hiding her own grin.  They both knew that Cata's ability to predict the future was as dismal as Elys' ability to light a fire.

"We live in Daila.  A village of farmers.  We're going to be like everyone else.  We're going to learn to reap and sow and everything in-between and get married to some nice strong _dull farm boy and have a big family and then die, still on the same farm, never having gone anywhere or done anything," said Cata, fuming enough that Elys paid as much attention as she could so soon after waking._

"Farming's a perfectly noble profession.  We feed all the lands on the Eastern Sea, Cata.  You have to put your heart and soul into the earth to be masters like we are."

"And that's just fine in my opinion.  But let the people who want to put themselves in the ground ahead of time do that.  I'm not meant for it, and neither are you," said the girl, crossing her arms in annoyance at the resistance Elys was putting up.  Cata rather suspected her friend of arguing just because she could, and so made a point of taking no notice of her existence, preferring to brush some of the unavoidable dirt off her clothing.  Elys laughed, partially because it was such an obvious move, since Cata hardly cared about a little dirt, and partially because, aside from the purple silhouette of a falcon, the tunic's tan colour made finding any obvious dirt very difficult.

"What, then?  You're barely eighteen.  You don't have much of a choice except to stay here, for now.  What other possibilities are there?"  Elys had shaken away the last sleepy bindings of being quickly awoken and refreshed herself with a little Mercury Psynergy.  

Cata took a deep breath, preparing herself to argue this unflinchingly.  "I want to be a knight."  Elys said nothing, and she rushed on ahead.  "A roaming warrior of justice, saving people, villages, entire _kingdoms from terrible dangers.  I want to go slay dragons and evil monsters, lead whole contingents of stalwart warriors to victory against impossible odds, save thousands of lives from oppressive tyrants.  And stop deadly assassination attempts on royalty- no, not just any royalty, a brave and valiant prince who's being forced to remain in the castle by his overprotective mother -the queen, of course- who doesn't want him to associate with common people."  Cata was pacing back and forth now, lost in her head, gesturing forcefully as she spoke.  Elys looked on and tried not to laugh.  "But we'll succeed, and find out it was a plot of an evil duke, halt his attack on the king, and be sent off with great rewards, though none truly satisfying… and then the prince will sneak out of the castle in the night, as we're leaving… to find us, come with us… saying he couldn't bear to let me go so quickly…"_

Elys couldn't help it, and broke down completely, laughing too hard to draw a breath.  Cata turned on her friend, her face red with fury and no small measure of embarrassment.  "I'm sorry," Elys gasped, and that was, by sheer chance, exactly the wrong thing to say.

"Along with various other adventures of a similar sort that would no doubt put me in tales and songs for a THOUSAND YEARS!" finished Cata, screaming the last like a battle cry as she tackled Elys.

Elys' mother took no notice of the heavy winds rushing through the house as she carried out four sacks of potato seeds, nor the shards of ice that flew out of Elys' room and exploded into a layer of frost on the far wall.

"Okay, so say this is an actual possibility," said Elys, lying comfortably on the floor with her elbows resting on Cata, who had been straitjacketed with the blanket to the point of immobility.  "You're going to be a knight and find all sorts of kingdoms and such.  And slay terrible monsters.  Yes?"

"That's the general idea," replied the cotton roll.

"How, precisely, do you plan to get started?" asked Elys.  Cata was silent, and the Mercury Adept sighed.  "This is your problem.  You're a Mars Adept stuck in a Jupiter Adept's body.  You never think these things through."

"I've already got a horse," she pointed out.

"Zak agreed to this?"

"Zak has a choice?"

"I just hope you don't intend to cross much water on this journey of yours."

"Why would I?  The only places out there are Lemuria, Izumo, and Apojii.  They aren't big enough to need knights."

"You're really serious, aren't you?"

"Absolutely, Elys."

Elys thought for a moment.  "Well, I guess that's good.  You're right, you aren't meant to live here.  I always knew you'd leave.  I'm just glad you didn't rush off in the middle of the night."

"…Well…" said the roll, slowly.  Elys lifted a layer and looked at her best friend suspiciously.

"That was a very meaningful sort of well, Cata.  What's the rest of the sentence?"

"…Well… um… look, you can't just have a knight and a horse.  It doesn't work!"

"You want me to come _with you?" Elys demanded._

"I'm just suggesting-"

"That I leave my home and family to go with you on a journey against terrible monsters and save kingdoms and rescue snobby princes?" finished Elys, and she was right, though Cata would have chosen words that didn't make her plan sound about as sane as asking for shortcake in a crowded Loho restaurant.

"I think-"

"Look, Cata, this is a little crazy.  I can understand wanting to see other places, and I figured some delusion about becoming a knight couldn't hurt, since there isn't much danger in the world anyway, but I am _not going to be your squire or something!"_

"All right!  I wasn't asking you to be a servant or anything, I just thought you might want to come along.  Journey of a lifetime, you and me.  But I can understand if you don't want to," said Cata, very carefully not suggesting that Elys was scared.  She knew her friend well.

"I am _not_ scared, Cata," Elys added, and Cata struggled not to grin.

"I didn't say you were.  I'm going to go say goodbye to Cian, want to go with me?" she offered.

Elys was quiet for a moment, and sighed.  "All right.  He's probably at the river."

The river at Daila's western edge was a peaceful place, the sort of location that held a great deal of inspiration for an artist who loved nature.  Cian was good at finding such spots, often hidden from view.  Here, though, he had simply found a large flat rock that just barely connected to the riverbank, and the sound of the water rushing around it would calm even a furious dwarf.  The canopy of leaves filtered the sunlight into strange shapes on the ground, and he loved the way they danced in the wind.

"A shame no painting will ever do such a thing," he muttered, but his brush danced too, slowly making the shadows lie still on the grass on the canvas.  This was the forty-eighth time he had tried to capture those effects.  The Lemurian rather expected there would be a forty-ninth, and more.  Even those who didn't live in their homeland carried the spring water with them, and he felt little rush.  Anyone who didn't know his heritage -which, he reflected as he brushed back long blue hair, would be limited to the colour-blind- wouldn't have placed the 'young' man at anything more than twenty-one, but he had seen more than six decades already, and would see many more.

Some would be more interesting than others, he knew, and thought this point nicely punctuated with the rustling as Cata and Elys walked among the trees behind him, nearing the river.  The girls seemed to be in their usual state of eternal minor argument, but they stopped soon after noticing him.

"Well met, Cata, Elys.  You don't often come here on your own.  Were you looking for me?" asked the Lemurian, setting aside his canvas and tried again to keep his hair out of his eyes.  This was, in all fairness, impossible for more than a few seconds, but that obvious fact never seemed to bother him.

"Morning," said Elys, by way of reply, and then looked meaningfully at her best friend.  "Cata's leaving.  Something about dragonslaying, I think."

"Knighthood," Cata explained, but rather sheepishly.  Every time she told someone else, the idea seemed less like ambition and more like lunacy.

"I should think it was about time you decided what you wanted to do," said Cian, and smiled.  At first, Cata thought it was sarcasm, but she realised after a moment that his words were sincere.

"Am I the only one who didn't expect me to pack up and head off some day?" she asked, feigning annoyance.

Cian shook his head.  "No.  We expected you to slip away in the dead of night.  If we were lucky, you might leave a letter."  Elys laughed, and Cata glared as well as she could at the sudden outburst.

"Okay, fine, you've made your point," the Jupiter Adept said.  She looked back to Cian.  "I'm leaving, and I take it you're not going to stop me.  I wanted to say good-bye."

"Thank you," said Cian, and held out his hand.  Cata took it and shook firmly.  "I don't doubt that whatever you want to do, you shall be very good at it."

"Thanks, Cian.  And I'll be back, you can count on it."

"Never mentioned to me that you were coming back," Elys muttered, in the midst of tying back her long purple hair.  Cata shot another glare her way, on the basis that she could only improve with practice.  Elys appeared not to take the slightest notice of it, and knelt by the riverbank, watching the occasional fish slide past.

Cata looked back at Cian, noticed she hadn't let go of his hand, and quickly did so.  She wasn't sure what else there was to say, really.  The Lemurian, though, had thought of something no one else had yet considered.

"Where are you going, anyway?"  Cata stared at Cian, stunned.  Elys looked back from the edge of the river, and laughed at the expression on her friend's face.  Cata noticed the amusement she was providing yet again, and decided she was tired of it.

"South," the Jupiter Adept replied firmly.

"You'll probably hit the Yampi desert before any kingdoms," Cian pointed out.

"Northwest," Cata said immediately, as though nothing contrary had ever been suggested.

It was probably best for Elys' general health that she was cut off from commenting.  Before the first syllable left her mouth, a loud, slightly melodic crash ran out from Daila, back beyond the forest's edge.  That was the sound of the giant bell at the village's centre, and it rang only in times of urgency.  The last time had been six years ago, when the coming of a flood had been felt by the Great Healer.

Cian, Elys, and Cata didn't speak.  They simply ran.

After a few minutes they cleared the trees, and saw farmers gathering at the village centre, around the bell.  Someone a bit overly enthusiastic moved to swing the massive hammer arm again, but was stopped by one of the many people nearby who didn't care for the idea of having their eardrums forcibly relocated to their elbows.

"What's going on?" called Cata, when they were close enough to be heard by someone at the crowd's edge.  The woman turned around, recognised them, and shrugged.

"Not a single clue.  Someone'll show up soon, I hope.  I'm betting on rain this afternoon, and there's still work I need to get done."  Cata noticed the twin-drops symbol on her sleeve, a sign of Mercury Adepts, and knew better than to argue.

After a few moments of fruitless questioning, since no one seemed to know what was happening, the Great Healer appeared and climbed onto the platform, in front of the arch holding the bell.  It still swung lightly, probably helped by the winds, which were starting to pick up.

The old man raised his hands, and silence flowed out from him, first forced by Psynergy (it took a moment for people to notice the words weren't coming out) and then simply accepted as the gathered farmers calmed down.

"People of Daila, fear not.  There is no great disaster, nor any threat to our village," the Healer assured them.  The crowd started speaking again, some relieved, others demanding to know why they had been called by the bell.  The Healer raised a hand again and silence fell over them again.  He relaxed, smoothed his beard, and continued.  "There is, however, an important matter that must be known.  The Sea God's Tear that is our sanctum's greatest treasure has been stolen."

"That can't be good," said Elys.

"That could be very good," said Cata, beneath her breath, and she could almost taste the quest.

"Cata!"

"_Well_…" she said, defensively, but offered no further argument.

"As such," the Great Healer went on, rather annoying at how often he was having to cast Silence on the crowd, "we are going to need a few volunteers to help with searching the surrounding land.  Not far, and we are only asking for those who are not needed at home."  He was silent for a moment.  "Some of you, the Mercury Adepts, have no doubt felt the sudden coming rain.  I believe that unless we bring the Sea God's Tear back to the temple, terrible storms may soon appear, unrelenting storms.  The Psynergy of the land is out of balance as long as the Tear is gone."

At first, everyone seemed too concerned to think about volunteering for a search.  It was in the nature of Dailans to protect their homes, and none wanted to be away if heavy storms were soon to be there.

"How long ago was it stolen?" called a villager, mostly because the quiet muttering throughout the crowd was starting to unnerve him.

"We found that the Tear was missing less than an hour ago," replied a temple Adept, a no-nonsense figure in pristine sky blue robes with perfectly even brown hair.  Cata mistrusted such people on principle.  No one who was physically that untainted could be the same figuratively.

"The thief has no reason to remain near Daila," said Cata, loudly.  "Some of us should go to ask the Kibombo to be on the lookout as well.  No one can cross their borders unseen."

"You make a good point, young Cata," said the Healer.  "Who shall go to speak to the Kibombo?"

"I volunteer, Great Healer," said Cata quickly, before anyone else had a chance.

"What do you think you're doing?" demanded Cata's mother, who had been wading through the crowd –a stunned villager who hadn't been quick enough in getting out of the way stood nearby.  Cata's mother took a deep breath.  "Look, I know you said you wanted to see other places, meet other people-" Cata avoided Elys' eyes with admirable skill "-but to go off after _thieves_?  Are you insane?!"

"Mom, come on, I can take care of myself for a few days-"

"Cold Mars you can!" her mother shot back.  "You don't know anywhere but Daila-"

"That's the _problem-_"

"You don't know what these people are like!  Thieves are dangerous!  They could be Angaran, for all we know!  I'm not going to let you go off alone chasing barbarians!"

"I'll go with her," said Cian.  It was unlike him to speak up in the middle of something like that, so everyone gave the words due consideration (including Cata).  Cian grinned.  "I guarantee I won't let anything happen to her."

"You?" repeated Cata's father, who had managed to catch up with his trailblazing wife.  "You're hardly any older than she is!"

"Actually, sir, I'm twice your age," said Cian, evenly.  Cata's father withdrew for a moment, and a few words passed between him and her mother, including 'Lemuria', 'spring water', and 'bloody ancient'.

"Well… maybe, I suppose…" Cata's father admitted.  "All right.  If you really must."

Cata smiled to the point where people nearby wondered if she _was_ insane.  Elys wasn't surprised when the Jupiter Adept turned to face her, and didn't bother waiting for the question.  "Okay, yes," she relented.  "I'll go with you for this.  But when it's over we're coming straight back here."  Cata didn't argue; she always waited until the argument was unavoidable to let it start.  For now, winning was good.  "You go get ready to leave.  I'm going to tell my parents I'm going with you."

"Do you really expect them to simply let you go?" asked the Lemurian.

"I'll wait and let someone else tell them where we're going."  The girls ran.

Cata skidded to a halt at the edge of Zak's fenced area beside her house.  The horse blinked his huge brown eyes at her in a way that suggested he didn't intend to go running anywhere anytime soon, so that particular idea could be abandoned now.

"Don't give me that look," Cata told him, and vaulted over the fence.

"What do you expect?  I'm good at it," replied the grey marchador.  Zak was hardly unique in having Psynergy, but people who didn't expect a horse to tell them off for trying to buy him were often surprised, and usually took a few moments to realise where the words were coming from.  Zak's lips didn't move as he spoke, he simply created the sounds with his mind and let other people sort it out.

"I expect you to listen to me when I tell you to.  I _am_ your rider, after all," replied Cata, and threw the very-nearly-a-saddle over his back.  "Come on.  We're going on an adventure.  After thieves."

"Horse thieves?" asked Zak, on the off chance that he might be interested.

"No.  They took the Sea God's Tear, whoever they are.  Oh, we're also going to ask the Kibombo to watch out for anyone suspicious," Cata added.

"Kibombo?" repeated Zak, and reared back slightly in surprise.  "Hold on.  They _eat_ horses."

"No they don't.  That's an unfair generalization.  Only a couple of deep-mountain tribes do that, and only for special ceremonies," Cata assured him, and tried to get onto his back.

"Yeah, well, one of these days they're going to run out, and I intend to be ready if they come looking," said Zak, but he knew perfectly well that he couldn't deny Cata her ride.  He was, ultimately, her horse, and would be as long as they both lived.

With more agility than he liked to admit having, Zak leapt over the fence and darted down the worn path, back to the village centre.  Cian and Cata were waiting there, and both of them had gathered a fair amount of supplies for a short journey like this.

"Is it really worth bringing Zak along?  Cian and I don't have mounts," Elys pointed out.

"We can take turns.  He'll be a big help when we're tired," Cata replied.

"Oh yes, don't worry about me, I'm just transportation.  And if you get bored, I could always try singing.  I really think I'm getting the hang of it," said Zak, shifting from dark muttering to annoying cheerfulness easily.

"I think I may agree with Elys on this one," said Cian.  Zak swung his head around to look the Lemurian straight in the eyes.  Cian was frozen, almost hypnotised, and watched as Zak raised one large hoof, then slammed it into the ground right between his feet.  The apparent trance broke, Cian looked down, and then back up.

"Now, the question is… did I miss?" asked Zak.  He waited for the remark to sink in.  "Right.  I'm going, thanks.  Why sit around waiting for horse-eating Kibombo raiders when I can go straight to them?  Get it over with.  Saves time."

"Okay," said Cian, ready to agree with just about anything.

Cata looked down at her friends, glancing only for a moment at the villagers, who hadn't quite dispersed yet.  "Ready to set out?"

"Please don't try to be dramatic," Elys requested.

"We are only going to talk to the Kibombo, Elys.  It is hardly a perilous undertaking," said Cian.

"Maybe for you bipeds," muttered Zak, still certain the near future was going to be unpleasant.

Cata was still looking back at Daila.  She waved to her parents, and managed, to her credit, to wave heroically.  The Adepts started off to the west, toward the Kibombo valley.  Cata settled into the for-lack-of-a-better-word saddle.  She smiled again, at the appropriate dark clouds blowing in from the horizon.  "It's about time," she decided.

**[Author's Notes]**  Totally new story, totally new characters, totally… well… sort of.  *evil grin*  No, I didn't just hint at anything.  Anyway, do review if you like it, and I make no promises on the next chapter, seeing as I've agreed to finish Tolbi Redux.  No, thank _you_.  And credit to the muse, just because it's deserved at all times.


	2. Cloudburst

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Two: Cloudburst**

"We aren't wasting any time, Cata," said Elys, and the tone of her voice made it clear that this was not a suggestion, it was a description of reality.  "We're heading for Kibombo and that's it.  No wandering around looking for trouble."

The four Adepts had been on the road for perhaps twenty minutes, and Cata began to wonder if three of them might not return, since the path to Kibombo would take at least two days, probably more.  They would have to go south past the northern edge of Narib or go through the mountains, and not even Cata much liked that idea.  Besides, if you could ignore the clouds that were starting to become very common in the skies above, it was nearly perfect weather for travel.  The sun was warm, the path was clear, and the thick forests to either side were effective wind-shapers, so that a pleasant breeze blew along the road.

"I have no idea what else you think I would suggest we do," said Cata calmly, soothed by the atmosphere and the rocking rhythm of Zak's pace.

"I don't mind carrying you," the horse pointed out, "but I really would prefer it if you'd at least remember that I can speak.  I know not every 'animal' can, but it's not hard.  Ouch!"

"Sorry, I must reflexively nudged you with both heels for more speed, forgetting that Cian and Elys don't have mounts."

"Hell of a nudge."

"And what do you know that we haven't been told, Zak?" asked Cian.  Though he had said he was going to protect and keep an eye on the girls, the Lemurian was well aware that he was only along for the ride here, and preferred to stand aside.  So far, he had been enjoying the spectacle.

"Oh, nothing, nothing, no horse could possibly have anything important to say," he grumbled.

"Come on, Zak," said Elys, using a tone of voice she wouldn't admit to having, and stroking his yellowish mane.  "What did she say?"

"Ouch!"  Zak turned back to glare at Cata, a skill that most horses didn't have.  Zak made up for it by being very good, raising the average skill of the species to an impressive level.

"Reflex," she said again.

"Nothing you don't already know," he replied, not taking his eyes off Cata.

"Figures she'd want to go looking for the thieves," said Elys.

"That's the one," Zak agreed.  Cata nudged him with both heels again.  He sighed.  "Right."  Zak took off at a mad gallop, pounding down the dusty road, and turning off to the side as they came up on a large rock sticking out of the ground like a lopsided fang.  Zak scrambled up the rock, placing his hooves with more skill than a normal horse would be capable of.  Finally smashing the edge with his back legs, he leapt out into the air, turning a full somersault before landing hard on the other side.

Elys and Cian ran to catch up.  Cata was flat against Zak's back, her arms wrapped around his neck in a death-grip, eyes wide and breathing hard.

"I didn't know you could do that," she gasped after a moment or two.

"I wasn't sure I could either," Zak replied, hiding his own shock very well.  "I haven't tried in a few years."  Cata wisely decided to cease commenting on anything for the next hour or so as they travelled towards the region called Narib, and wondered what they'd find there.

"I've heard they're big on philosophy," said Elys.

"Oh yes," agreed Cian, fervently, who knew Narib well from old adventures long ago.  "Throw a rock and you'll bring down five of them."

"There are that many philosophers?" asked Cata, daring to speak.

"No, they're just not all that physically formidable.  No heavy lifting involved with most philosophy.  Excluding the practical sort," the Lemurian admitted.

"The practical sort?" repeated Elys.

"Yeah.  There are basically three sorts of philosophy.  The kind that sounds good but doesn't mean much if you think about it, like 'is truth beauty', and the sort that makes your head hurt if you think about it, like 'is the nature of reality subjective or objective, and how can you prove it', and the practical sort that you want to think of before anyone else, like 'you know, a lever-and-pulley mechanism based on physical laws would be an excellent way to hurl massive quantities of exploding chemicals down onto the cities of our enemies'.  Of course, that was mostly left behind some time ago," finished Cian.

"How mostly?" asked Zak.  "And did they ever do the thing with launching dead horses onto enemy armies with trebuckets?  Bloody Angaran barbarians…"

"Trebuchets, cows, and no, they didn't," replied Cian.  "Too many chemists to bother with animals.  Another good area of philosophy, chemistry.  Potions of all sorts."

"Anything explosive?"

"Do you ever think maybe you're a little single-minded, Cata?" asked Elys.

"I just think that if we're going to go adventuring, we ought to be well-equipped," she replied.

"Fully agreed.  Absolutely.  Not a single thing wrong with that argument.  Oh, wait, no, I'm wrong, there's just one," said Elys, rather sarcastically, but without any venom.

"What?"

"_We are not going adventuring!  We are going to talk to the Kibombo and head back to Daila, and then you can do whatever you want, but this is not an adventure!_" exclaimed Elys, eyes wild.

"With the purple hair and all, you look rather demonic when you do that, Elys," Zak commented.

"Now, calm down," said Cata soothingly, reaching down and putting a hand on her friend's shoulder.  "Of course we're going adventuring, and the sooner you accept that, the easier it'll be."

Elys looked ready to explode.  Cian noted first that he almost expected the drop of rain that fell on her head to evaporate on contact, and then realised that the sky above them had filled with thick clouds that were steadily darkening.  And up ahead the trees gave way to massive rocks and hills.

Cian unfolded his map, in the hopes that the nature of the earth might have changed since the last time he passed this way, or that it had simply been a nightmare all along.  No such luck, of course.  They were heading into the Kandorean Cliffs, and so was a storm.  The sort of storm that the Great Healer thought was being created now that the Sea God's Tear was missing.

The sort of storm that could make an entire village fear it.

"Those canyons up ahead don't look too friendly," said Cata.  "I'm sure they don't need to be that dark."

"You remember the stories about the hunter?" asked Elys, oblivious to Cian's worries.

"Oh, please," Cata responded.

"You do remember.  The one who lives in the wild out here?  Hunting monsters, watching travellers.  And sometimes, if they don't look cautious enough, he hunts _them, just to remind people that he's out there, so you'd better watch your back."_

"Don't be an idiot, Elys."

"They say no one's ever told what his face looks like, because he kills them if they do.  It's because he's half-orc, and he worships every new moon by drinking blood."

"I don't remember those stories," said Zak.  "What's he called?"

"Megraghgah," said Elys, in as ominous a voice as she could manage.  It was rather ruined when Zak laughed, but the Lemurian interceded before she could go on.

"Cata," said Cian, "and, I suppose, Elys, although somehow I expect you won't listen to her, we need to make a decision, quickly."

A large drop struck Cata's head.  "Rain," Cata muttered, looking at the sky, and then looked back down at her companions.  "Don't tell me you're going to start on the adventuring thing too."

"I wish it were that minor," said Cian, avoiding Elys' unamused expression.  "We're coming up on the Kandorean Cliffs, and right behind us is a major storm."

"Daila," said Elys, looking worried.  "Already the storms are beginning?"

"We're far enough from the village that it's probably in no danger right now.  But we are.  We either stay here and wait for the storm to pass, or we try to outrun it to the other side of the Cliffs.  Getting caught by a storm in there would be a really nasty way to end this whole quest."

"Definitely a plan that could use work, getting killed by a storm in the middle of nowhere," Cata admitted.  "I guess it's probably safer to stay-"

"Any storm that can kill us is going to ravage Daila!  We have to move _fast_," declared Elys, who had been too horrified to even notice that Cata was in the middle of saying something sane.  "Come on, Zak, let's get a move on.  Cian, what's the fastest way through these Kandorean Cliffs?"

"Is she real?" whispered Cata, amazed, but didn't intend to argue the point.  After all, risks were part of the job, and if they stopped, the thieves would just get further ahead.

Cata had put a sword in with the rest of her supplies.  It was the family's version of a Veteran Kitchen Knife: ancient, well worn, notched, and fantastically sharp for no apparent reason.  Any casual observer would probably ask what kind of person puts a hilt on a saw, but any casual bandit would swear to be a better person for all his life if she would just put it away, or at least stop it pointing like that.

It wasn't going to help much in a storm.  Cata slipped off Zak's back, having far more energy than her friend, and Elys mounted the horse with a little help.

"I don't suppose either or both of you are likely to send this storm off into the Indra Sea and save us some trouble, are you?" asked Cata, without much hope.

"And perhaps I could part the ocean while Cian puts the clouds a few fathoms closer to the sea floor?" suggested Elys, scowling.  "Sweep them under the carpet, sort of thing?"

"Yes!" Cata agreed, brightly.

"No," corrected Cian, who was still managing to avoid grinning.  The storm made that easy enough.  "If we are going to move, we'd best do it fast.  The cliffs are no place to be caught in a storm."

And as Cata, Zak, and Elys followed their Lemurian friend into the rocky terrain, they learned precisely how right he was.  The rough, sheer stone walls rose up on both sides of the narrow path, worn free of grass by the passing of many people over many years, and massive boulders seemed ready to tumble down to crush them without much provocation.  If heavy rains fell, the path would become a river, and only after it had been filled by mudslides and avalanches.

After twenty minutes of squeezing through narrow passages, the cliffs broke up further, turning from a single fracture to a sort of spiky valley system; many paths could be taken through the stony ground, but they were strewn with obstacles.

At the beginning off all these paths, though, was one large clear space surrounded by large gravel slopes that led up to the passes.  And it would have been better for all involved if Jastyx hadn't paused with the intent of setting up any camp, or had chosen a more hidden location, and most of all if she hadn't been staring with intent curiosity at the Sea God's Tear when Cata caught sight of her.

"Oh my," muttered Zak, and tried to slip back behind the large rock they had just passed.

"Cata, don't do anything-"

"Move not a muscle, brigand and thief!"

"…Loud, brash, or stupid," Elys finished, but she had expected as much.  Cata leapt out over the broken stones of old rockslides and sprinted down to the flat ground.  The rocks skittered and tumbled beneath her feet, so that Cata reached the bottom off-balance, with a few inches of gravel covering her boots.

"Name yourself, rogue, that I may tell the villagers what fool thief once wore your head," Cata commanded, hands on her hips in the stance of a confident warrior.

"My name is Jastyx, and I really hope you rustics don't always talk like that," she replied, making it as obvious as possible that she wasn't impressed by Cata's sudden appearance.  Unfortunately, as near as Cian could tell, she really wasn't.

The woman looked to be about twenty, but had silver-white hair pulled back into a long tail that nearly reached the tops of her black boots.  In between those two striking features were frosty grey eyes and practical -yet somehow threatening- violet and black travelling robes.

"Rustics?!  I am Cata of Daila, knight and-"

"I'm afraid I have better things to do, little girl.  _Thorny Grave!"  Jastyx raised a hand and expelled a cloud of ghostly skulls that rushed through the air toward Cata, chattering and somehow glowing darkly._

"What should we do?" asked Elys, watching Cata leap to the side and the skulls turning stones to dust.

"I suppose we should try to stop her while we've got the chance," Cian replied.

"Cata or this Jastyx person?" muttered Elys, but she was already urging Zak forward.  Cian rose and pounded down the slope with long, solid strides, gathering power as he ran.  Jastyx had already started running, which made the Lemurian wonder.  Anyone with Psynergy strong enough to cast Thorny Grave wouldn't fear Cata, he had to admit.

Unless, of course, she was on a very specific mission that needed completing fast.  The Sea God's Tear didn't have any value Cian knew of, except to the Dailans.  But after long years on Weyard, Cian knew better than to dismiss the idea that it had much more value he _didn't know about._

"_Drench!_"  A strong blast of water rained down on Jastyx, annoying her more than hurting, but that wasn't the point.  When the torrent ended and the ground around the thief was covered in an inch or two of water, Cian lowered his hand and cast again.  "_Frost!"_

The air around him swirled and went cold as the Mercury Psynergy was projected into the water.  The little flood went solid in a spreading wave, and only jumping as the crystals flew past kept Jastyx from being frozen in place.  When she landed, though, her feet slipped on the ice, and she landed hard.

Cata, who had just discharged the last sickly skull by hurling a large stone into it, saw Jastyx slip forward on the ice and decided that the best solution would be to see to it that she didn't feel like getting up again.  She hadn't often tried attacking Psynergy, but some things came naturally.

"_Ray!_"  From the clouds that were already beginning to sail overhead, a cluster of minor lightning bolts stabbed downwards.  They struck Jastyx and every muscle went tense as she cried out, but when the silver-maned woman opened her eyes, Cata could have sworn they were truly red with fury.

"_Quake!_"  A slap from one of Jastyx's hands make the earth tremble and shattered the ice, which had already been stricken by Cata's ray.  With less difficulty than any of them had expected, the thief stood.  "It appears you're more resourceful than I gave you credit for," she admitted in a growl.

Elys and Zak had been careful not to be noticed as they rode around to the far side, so that the four adventurers (some more willing than others) now surrounded Jastyx on three sides.  And now, while she couldn't see it coming, Elys struck, if reluctantly.

"_Prism!_"  A large fragment of ice launched toward the strange woman, and though she spun wickedly fast, it was just in time to see the projectile coming.  The Prism shattered into fragments, but when the air cleared of dust-like snow, Jastyx still stood, one fist extended.

"That is so wrong," said Zak.  No one else had moved, either.  Then, at last, Jastyx straightened, and looked right at the horse and his rider.

"_Stone Spire!_"  A volley of large stalactites rocketed toward Elys.

"Run!" she screamed, kicking Zak's sides.

"Ow!  I _know, thanks!" he shouted in reply, dashing as fast as he could._

"_Rockfall_!_"  Boulders burst from the ground and rained down on Cian, sending him dodging and rolling to avoid being crushed.  "And you," said Jastyx, looking at Cata.  "Something special for you.  _Condemn!_"  She raised her hand, and for a moment was surrounded by the spectre of a cloaked skeleton carrying a scythe.  It vanished, then reappeared, scythe slowly rising, near Cata.  That faded too, and flickered in and out again, closer.  A second later, the face of Death looked into Cata's eyes.  The scythe's blade burned red._

It was too long to run from, or to dodge either way.  There was only one escape, the one most people would give anything to avoid.  She dove forward, straight through the ribs of Death, and heard the rocks where she had stood moments before explode with sudden heat.

"Totally unreliable attack," muttered Jastyx, scowling at the so easily dodged strike.  "Got courage, too."  She didn't like that, either.  She ran.

Cata stood and rubbed her sore palms as Elys, Zak, and Cian came up on either side of her.  "I suppose now we chase her," said Elys, resigned to at least a short adventure.

"That's right," Cata replied, and called up a more natural form of Jupiter Psynergy.  A faint purple aura rose around her, and when Cata ran, she nearly blurred.  Cian leapt onto Zak's back in a single, smooth motion, but Elys didn't take the time to think about the oddly practised look, and simply let the horse start running.

"I hope you don't both intend to stay up there all day," Zak said, his Psynergy-speech unaffected by the efforts of running.  "I mean, either one, sure, but you _and the Lemurian are a bit much."_

"The sooner you get ahead, the sooner I can get off," Cian replied.  Zak galloped faster, finding solid footing even across the endless heaps of broken stones.  They charged into the steep-walled valley that Jastyx and Cata had already entered.

What was bothering Cian the most as Zak pounded ahead was that he had known from the beginning that they could not hope to 'outrun' any storm, and certainly not one caused by a Psynergy imbalance.  He just wanted to make sure the cliffs were behind them when the storm did reach them, and that was not going to happen now.  The sky was almost entirely covered in steel-grey clouds and scattered raindrops were falling.

The small valley stayed much wider than the pass they had entered through, but the walls reached higher and with nearly-vertical faces.  The ground, fortunately, flattened into the usual earth, rather than a collection of eroded fragments.

This, unfortunately, was because a little-known trait of Grassils was their obsession with neatness.  This might seem odd to humans, but the Psynergy-boosted evolution of the blade-weasels (theirs are the Weasel's Claws that contain natural Jupiter Psynergy) had been surprisingly effective.  The Grassils' neatness meant that no prey ever suspected a predator was in the area, never found a telltale remnant of the last meal.

Grassils are mostly herbivores.  The _mostly_ is important.  They do eat meat on occasion.  And there is one species, the most chaotic and messy of all, one that they often cannot stand.  Humans.  The only thing saving them was that Grassils are nocturnal.

Not even Cian knew about the Grassils.  No one could warn anyone, even Jastyx was oblivious of the danger.  She turned back and saw Cata cover the last distance at Jupiter-powered speeds and draw her sword.  The dark clouds overhead were a perfect barrier now, so dark it was like the sun had already set.

The first drops fell as Jastyx turned.  She drew a cross of Psynergy in the air, which flew into the ground in front of Cata, who skidded to a halt, uncertain of what was happening.  The crust of the earth cracked and then burst, and a streak of gathering metal flew out, twisting and melting into the shape of a solid (if boring) longsword.

"Why on Weyard would someone put a hilt on a saw?" asked Jastyx, grinning smugly.

"Less talk more surrender," snapped Cata in reply.

"If you insist."  Jastyx extended the smooth, sharp blade at arm's length, so that it was uncomfortably close and pointing at Cata's neck.  "I don't have many terms, except that you go home right now."

"I think we're past that sort of joke," said Cata.

"Ah.  The stupid sort of hero."

Cata was too angry to reply now, she simply twisted and swung as forcefully as she could, a blow that would have cut deeply into the Venus Adept if her own newly-shaped sword had not sprung into action as well.  Cata might as well have swung at a wall for all she managed to even rock Jastyx's blocking arm.

Resigned to physical combat -she couldn't spare the concentration for Psynergy- Jastyx fell into her simple, streamlined fighting mentality.  There was nothing in all the world worth noticing except the ground beneath her feet, the blade in her hands, and the attacks from her opponent.

Zak pounded over the stones, ignoring the weight of the extra riders.  Cata was somewhere up ahead, but rain was falling; the storm was long brewed and was now boiling over with a vengeance.

"I wonder how far they went," muttered Elys, who approved of water more in rivers and such, rather than streaming into her eyes, as this was beginning to.

"I wonder if anyone would notice if I cast Drench again," muttered Cian.  The rain really was making itself as known as a meteorological phenomenon can.  Somewhere up ahead, someone let out a battle cry.  "That far," Cian answered, louder.  Thunder rolled overhead.

Cata didn't realise how fortunate she was that Jastyx didn't really have any interest in seeing her dead.  Her swings were overly wide, her defences were riddled with gaps, and she was working mostly on outraged instinct.  Against an opponent who was busy thinking of other things, these weren't so bad.  But they were about to be.

At last the rain was too much, and Jastyx decided to leave the girl unconscious.  Her friends would no doubt find her, but not until Jastyx got away.  So, she spun, swung, positioned her blade, and managed a strange sort of levering block that sent Cata staggering backwards.

The time to took to cross those few steps, on the offensive now, was enough for Cata to try another tactic, though.  She raised a hand.  "_Plasma!_"  Such Psynergy was easy in the midst of a storm.  A fang of lightning stabbed out of the clouds and blasted the cliff wall behind Jastyx, sending a good many boulders crashing down around Jastyx.

The Venus Adept had just managed to catch a large one directly above her when a squealing cry began to echo off the stone walls.  The Grassils had awakened, and they didn't much like it.

A dozen of the weaselish faces appeared from niches in the cliffs that they had chosen to make their den, and then a dozen more.  And more.  All screeching a warning to the others.  They leapt out into mid air and began swooping down on the Adepts.  Elys, Zak, and Cian arrived just in time for the second wave to catch sight of them.

"Oh, this is just fantastic," said the Lemurian, leaping off Zak's back and drawing his sabre and rushing to help Cata.  "You might want to just stay out of it," he warned Zak.

"If you insist," replied Zak, instantly, but Elys slipped off too, intending to put her Psynergy to whatever use presented itself.

Jastyx sprinted down the path, but when Cata moved to follow, a Grassil cleaved the air in front of her face, and she was convinced to stay put for a time.  The things were swarming now, a feat not often achieved by mammals, and in the heavy rain and clouded darkness, it was hard to see what was blade weasel and what wasn't.  Cian and Elys were suddenly at her side.

"Nice of you to finally show up," she said.

"Sorry, we stopped off at this cute little antique shop-" began Elys.

"Look out!" shouted Cian.  The girls ducked and, reluctantly, Cian swept his sabre through the air horizontally, severely trimming the beast's claws and gashing its chest as well.  The Grassil flopped to the ground, turned grey, and dissolved into nothing.

"Is that supposed to happen?" asked Elys, rather shaken, since she had been kneeling right beside where it had fallen.

"Yes," Cian answered as they rose again.  He sliced to ward off another Grassil.  "When a creature corrupted by Psynergy dies, the power is unbound, which usually causes them to… well, turn to dust or melt or something."

"_Ice_!"  The shards flew from Elys' hands and lashing into the monster that had just slashed at her.  She watched the results.  "Hmm.  So it does."

"You can be scary sometimes," Cata commented, which was probably praise.  She ducked and swung a retaliatory strike at a Grassil as it dove overhead.  The Adepts were staying close together, though, so they were hard to properly attack.  A second cry went up, and from a larger cave in the cliff came another beast.  This one was larger, nastier, and was hovering rather than gliding.

"What's that?" asked Cata.  Cian turned, hoping it was nothing, but was quickly told otherwise.  Grassils didn't have the Psynergy to hover like that.

"It's a Little Death," he answered, and found that his voice was tainted with fear.

"Better than a lot of death, I suppose," said Elys.  The Little Death screamed and dove down into the midst of the Adepts, slashing madly.  Cian rolled well enough to avoid a severe injury from the monster's scythe arm, and Cata was simply knocked aside by the creature's diving tackle, but a thick line of red appeared on Elys' side, under the gashed cloth of her tunic.  It smashed into her forehead first and drove her to the ground, but Cian's sabre bit into its arm before the Little Death could do any more damage.

It turned on him, as he hoped, but the sheer ferocity of the beast's attacks forced Cian to stay defensive, incapable of getting in a single stab, which could be all he needed.  A glance to the side showed the Cata, now standing alone, was being severely harassed by the Grassils, and her shoulders were covered with minor cuts.  

The Little Death screeched and somehow managed to get around Cian's guard, carving into his arm.  The Lemurian was out of practice in combat, he knew, but not how much.  The burning pain made his fingers release the sabre, which clattered to the ground, and a second slash nicked his side.

Lightning flashed.

The Little Death prepared to rip Cian apart.

"_Unleash Squall!_"

Lightning flashed again, this time led by a pair of dazzling swords.  They dove into the Little Death's back, and after a moment of shock, both literal and figurative, it greyed out too.  The Grassils took note, and most fled.  The few who didn't were quickly felled by the graceful swings of those two beautiful blades.  A moment later, it was just the four of them in the dark valley.  Zak clopped closer, cautiously.

"Get your friend, she needs healing immediately," said the new warrior.  The figure turned to Cata.  "If you're going to chase rogues and monsters, you'd better learn how to use that thing soon.  Now come on.  My home isn't too far ahead."  It turned and started away.

"We're supposed to trust you?  We don't even know your name!" shouted Cata over the storm.

The figured stopped and turned.  In another lightning flash, they saw a girl, probably not much older than Cata, with short, ragged brown hair and earthy red eyes.  "…You can call me Meg," said the girl.  She turned and continued walking.  The others had little choice except to follow her.

**[Author's Notes]** Not much to say, really.  The muse gets credit, of course.  Do review if you like it, or even if you don't.


	3. The Road To Kibombo

**Knights of Alchemy  
  
Chapter Three: The Road To Kibombo**  
  
  


  
                Meg's home was a small cave, perhaps twenty feet off the ground, and if not for the heavy rain that was slowly turning the canyon into a river, Zak probably would have given the broken stone 'stairs' a miss. Instead, with Cata's help, he slowly clambered up the heap while Meg and Cian saw to Elys inside, having gone ahead to get her out of the rain.

                "What are you three –four," Meg corrected herself, remembering the strange horse, "doing in the Kandorean Cliffs? Especially with a storm coming?   It's been brewing for more than a day, don't tell me you were caught off guard."  
                "We had hoped to reach the other side before it struck," Cian replied, gently producing pure water to clean the worst gash from the Little Death. "We came from Daila, searching for a thief and hoping to ask the Kibombo for help."  
                "Oh yes, the Kibombo and their legendary border guard," said Meg, from the back of the cave. Though the first several feet in from the mouth were bare, Meg had put together an interesting home in the back, and hanging over what was probably a bed was a bag full of a dozen or more kinds of plants.  She had untied it from the tiny crag and was looking through the many herbs. "Are Little Deaths poisonous?"  
                "You don't know?" said Cian, surprised. He would have expected someone as clearly wild as Meg to know every secret of the many beasts in the surrounding land.  
                "I've never been hit by one," she answered with a slight grin.  
                "I don't think they are, no," replied the Lemurian. "In any case, I could   handle poison."  
                "Does it look infected?"  
                "Not yet, but it's very recent."  
                "Can you handle infections?"  
                "…Not that I know of."  
                "Uh-huh," said Meg, as though she expected the answer. The huntress picked a few broad leaves and a large toxic-orange berry from the many plants.   
                "You do what you can, o mighty healer, and I'll handle everything else."  
                "You don't like healers?" asked Cian, conversationally, as he began casting Ply Psynergy.  
                "I've no special love for Lemurians. You're all so… civilized," she said, the last word touched by sarcasm. "It's no wonder the senate wants to seal the island. I'm surprised you've let the rest of the backwards world even walk on your sacred ground this long." After a long moment of shredding the   
leaves in a rough mortar and picking up a pestle to mash in the berry, she looked up at Cian. "No reply?"  
                "You're entitled to your opinion," he explained, engrossed in his work.  
                "How civilized," said Meg, but this time it was more like a joke, without venom.  
                Sounds of a struggle being decided came from just outside the cave, and Cata rose into view, Zak just behind her. The horse, exhausted and ducking, scrambled into the too-low haven and lay down to rest. Cata didn't look so relaxed, though 'relaxed' would be a difficult word to attach to the dripping horse, too.  
                "All right, prove it," Cata demanded.                 
                "What?" asked Cian and Meg in unison.  
                "You. 'Meg'."

                "Prove what?"  
                Cata paused for a moment, as though it should be obvious, and then thought again. "I don't know!" she said at last. "Anything! Everything! Prove we're safe here, firstly!"  
                "You don't trust me?" asked Meg, innocently mixing her salve.  
                "I'd have to be pretty foolish to trust anyone who has stories about being half-orc and blood-drinking told about her. You're telling me those are totally unfounded?" asked Cata.

                "I'm telling you that villagers with kids who won't shut up sometimes take something they know very little about and make it scary, on the off chance the brats'll be terrified into a moment of quiet," said Meg, making it very clear who she meant.

                "And that's supposed to make me trust you?" asked Cata, not particularly swayed but quite insulted. Meg sighed.

                "No, I don't suppose you're the type to listen to reason," the huntress muttered, and held out a hand. Cata looked at it sceptically, thinking Meg was trying to make a gesture of truce. A moment later, though, with a flicker of purple light, the elemental that had felled the Little Death and saved Cian appeared. It was a Djinni.  
                "That's a Djinni!" exclaimed Cata, knowing the strange, powerful creature from the legends told by all Adepts around Weyard. Meg looked amused.  Djinn, the servants of the Elemental Spirits, would never ally themselves with someone not on the side of justice.  
                "Squall, Djinni of Jupiter, at your service," said the Djinni, inclining her head and extending her wings to either side in a sort of Djinni bow-curtsey. "Do stop maligning Meg, she's got a rough enough time as it is."  
                "Oh really?" Cata looked at the twin swords now resting against the back wall. "What sort of suicidal creature would cause trouble for anyone with those things?"  
                "They don't. I bother them, because even civilized people deserve help when they're in danger. The Kandorean Cliffs are dangerous, but people often pass through, and I hunt monsters to keep everyone else safe," said Meg.  
                "And you've got the whole issue with cities," said Squall, when no one spoke up.  
                "Quiet, Squall," snapped Meg.  
                "How did you get a Djinni, anyway?" asked Cata, more trusting after Squall's appearance.  
                "Djinn are not acquired," said Squall, and there was a sort of not-serious injured pride to her tone. "We select worthy individuals and join with them to further the struggle of good against corruption and savagery."  
                "Are all Djinn this bad?" Meg laughed at the Dailan girl's question.  
                "You'd get used to it," she replied. "After so many years, all I hear is a faint humming."  
                "A mere sixteen years," said Squall. "I still rue the day I saved you from that Flash Ant." The Jupiter Djinni turned to Cian. "She looked so harmless at the time, I swear it."  
                The Lemurian took little notice, still busy mending Elys' wounds. "I really should have kept up my healing skills," he muttered, and looked up at Meg. "I hope whatever you're mixing over there can handle blood loss, because I forget how."  
                "As a matter of fact, it can," said Meg. "Though I suppose if you can     figure out how to close those injuries afterwards, that would be some help." The huntress joined Cian by Elys, who still had not awoken, and whatever they started doing made Cata's stomach reach a state to which 'rotations per minute' was applicable. She turned away and moved to the cave's edge, in the hopes that the storm might be abating.  
                That wasn't likely, of course, and a quick glance at the raging river that had been the valley pass told Cata they weren't leaving any time soon. She sighed, resigned, and returned to the back of the cave, where there was an invitingly thick mat. With her pack as a pillow, Cata lay down to rest, and was asleep in moments.

                "I had better go with you for now," Meg announced the following morning, once everyone was better rested.  "The way you three-"

                "Four," Zak corrected, but he was long used to such oversights.

                "-Four attract monsters, it'll be faster to go with you than scout the area.  There might not be a Wolfkin this side of the Cliffs before the day is out."

                "Only if you're sure you want to," said Cian.  He was packing away the various healing items and equipment from the previous night.  Their usefulness was proven, though, since Elys was conscious, upright, and speaking.

                "I wonder if Jastyx got to high ground," Cata said to herself.

                "I hope so," said Elys, who overheard her friend.  Cata turned, looking stricken.  "Well, I don't want to have to go searching for the Tear in these rocks.  Or worse, check a corpse."

                "Looks like your techniques were more effective than we had hoped," Meg commented to Cian, nodding at Elys, who was obviously recovered from the previous night.

                "You mean 'more than we _could_ have hoped'," the Lemurian said, but he wasn't sure.

                "Not if she intends to keep going on about corpse-searching," Meg replied, and Cian nodded.

                "Aside from beating the hell out of any monsters we happen to stumble across, d'you think you can help us out somehow?" asked Elys.

                "Actually," said Meg, "I do happen to know of a shortcut through the Naribwe Ridge."

                "Shortcuts are not what I had in mind," Elys responded.

                "We should take what we can get," Cata pointed out.

                "I just don't think shortcuts are a good idea.  They always go wrong.  Especially for new adventurers.  You've got to agree with that much, Cata."

                "Ah, but Cian's not new," she pointed out.

                "He's not the leader," Elys countered.

                "Ha!  That's right.  _I_ am.  And we'll follow Meg."

                "I should have known a Jupiter Djinni would lead to hero-worship," Elys muttered, turning away.  She hadn't expect to change her friend's mind anyway, but something felt wrong on a very basic level about taking a perfectly safe shortcut led by a local huntress.

                The guards at the gates of Naribwe, capital city of the Narib region, were often bored.  The entire province was filled with philosophers, and this was the main reason no one ever attacked.  Philosophers don't make many enemies.  When they do, they don't last long, because one topic guaranteed to inspire genius in a philosopher is their own personal safety. 

                Just behind the walls of the northwest gate were cantilever contraptions capable of hurling caltrops with four-foot spikes nearly two hundred feet beyond the city walls.  At every guard tower was a Psynergy stone built into a philosophical device that could manipulate Venus Psynergy no matter the user's element, creating sinkholes anywhere around the city walls.

                Naribwe tended to be peaceful, though.  It had always been humble, right back to its ancient roots as a simple village or two.  They had never attacked another city in their long existence, had a generally accepted and uncorrupted government, and welcomed anyone not actively brandishing weapons and screaming battle cries.

                So the guards were almost always bored.  The job attracted quiet people who liked to stand and think for hours on end, interspersed with the occasional traveller of some sort.  The one flaw was that even thoughtful types like a bit of action now and then.  This was bad timing for Meg's first visit to a city in years.

                A clicking, slamming rumble moved through the trees on the nearest mountainside, shaking trees and crushing some of the smaller underbrush.  Eventually it stopped, the dislodged boulders having crashed to a rest, and Cata emerged from the trees.  She was battered, dusty, scratched, and so dishevelled that the word was coming to the minds of people who didn't even know it.  Elys, looking somewhat better, was close behind.

                "I probably could have predicted that," said Elys.  "And I'm not even Jupiter-aligned."

                "Shut," Cata gasped fiercely, and after a moment she added "Up."

                "Well, it's only logical, isn't it?  The inexperienced adventurers have a hell of a time taking the shortcut, and the ones who know what they're doing amble by in perfect calm and safety.  Speaking of which, do you think we left them by the unstable waterfall, or the rockslide?" asked Elys conversationally, looking back up the slope.

                "The rockslide," Zak replied, stumbling slightly as he emerged from the trees.  "And thanks for your concern, but it's really not necessary," he added, sarcastically.

                "Are you all right?" called one of the guards, guardedly.  The girls noticed them for the first time.  Zak contented himself with wandering over the river for a drink and pretending he didn't know them.  Humans caused most of their own problems.

                "No!" Cata replied, with a touch of 'who could look like this and be all right' sarcasm.  Unfortunately, due to common Narib mythology, this was exactly the wrong time for Meg to catch up, along with Cian.  Naturally, she did, and a few moments of uncertainty followed while the three guards looked at each other, none quite wanting to say it first.

                "Megraghgah!" one shouted at last.

                "Looks like it's not just Daila, then," said Cata, as the guards approached.

                "You don't sound worried," Meg commented, hands edging to her swords.

                "Not with a Jupiter Djinni on our side," Cata replied.  But when she noticed that the incoming guards were all carrying pikes with rather philosophical blades, and carrying them like people who wouldn't be unhappy to use them in the near future, she did begin to wonder.

                The guards stopped, at the captain's signal, about ten feet away.  "Release your captives, beast," he commanded.  Meg did nothing except a slight twitch in the direction of a smile.  "You would do well to take us seriously, savage.  Though your appearance be fair, we know the twin claws and bloody eyes of terrible Megraghgah well enough."

                "Claws?" mumbled Elys.  "You people really pay attention to ghost stories, don't you?"

Cata leaned over and studied Meg's face more closely.  "Well… I guess, if you wanted to, you could say her eyes were a sort of dry blood colour.  But it's a pretty disgusting way to put it."

                "Fear not, young lady, you shall be protected from this demoness," said a guard, whose grip on his pike was wavering more than slightly.

                "Oh, that's it," Cata stated, taking 'young lady' as an insult to her knightly aspirations.  "She's not a half-orc, you half-wit!  And we're not prisoners!"

                "…You aren't?" repeated the captain.

                "Anti-Forced Speech Act of 1259, sir," said a lieutenant, quietly.  "In a situation involving hostile Adepts, no testimony is to be taken from hostages, in case Psynergy is being used to induce-"

                "Mars Adepts are about as good at controlling other people as the ambassador here is at fireballs," said Meg, gesturing at Cian.

                "Ambassador?" repeated the captain.

                "It's a joke, I'm not-" Cian began.

                "He's Lemurian," a guard realised.

                "The Lemurian ambassador has been taken hostage by a half-orc?!" exclaimed the captain.

                "Will you people just be quiet and listen for a moment?" demanded Squall, appearing on Meg's shoulder.  The guards leapt back, dropped their weapons, and scrambled to pick them up again.

                "It's a Djinni!" more than one of them shouted.

                "Squall, that wasn't great timing," said Cata.

                "Bah.  I'm sure that we can sort this all out easily enough," Squall replied.

                As judges went, this one looked exceptionally severe.  The Hall of Justice wasn't exactly a friendly place to begin with; it felt more like a well-lit tomb than anything else.  But with this judge at the front of the room, and all the quiet onlookers surrounding her, Meg was prepared to believe that at one word, it would soon become her _personal_ tomb.

                "That's it.  Really," said Cata, glaring at the guard who had starting jabbering about Acts at the gates.  "Not a half-orc, not an ambassador, not hostages.  We were just hoping to rest here, maybe get a few more horses for the road to Kibombo."

                "We've already-" began Cata, but then she looked back to Elys.  "Zak slipped away, didn't he?"

                "Maybe he was the smart one," Elys said, quietly.

                "There's another of you in the city?" demanded the judge.

                "No, Zak's a horse, and probably outside the city."

                "And what about _it_?" asked the judge, pointing at Squall.

                "_She, you robed plebeian," replied Squall.  Then she added, less quietly than would have been best, "I always thought that having so many Venus Adepts in one city was dangerous.  They go and write laws down.  And then follow them to the letter, like it's somehow important."_

                The judge had turned red, an uncommon colour for a Venus Adept, and he slapped his palm in the place where a non-Adept judge might have had a gavel.  A fracture ran down through the bench and the floor rippled.  The audience might have jumped at the sound, or they might have simply been thrown by the extra force of the judge's Quake Psynergy.

                "Enough!" he shouted.  "I deem you unworthy of this Hall and sentence you to trial by symposium.  You will be taken to the South Hall of Philosophers, and they shall decide the best course of action to take with you, 'Meg' of Kandorean.  You will be allowed to argue your case as well as you can, but do not expect leniency.  The people of Narib know much of you and the things you have done."

                "Apparently not," Squall shot back, but she chose not to electrocute anyone as the guards led Meg to the 'symposium', whatever on Weyard that was.  Cata, Elys, and Cian were told to wait outside by guards carrying extremely philosophical weaponry, and so had little choice but to wait while Meg faced Naribwe justice.

                "This's a symposium, huh?" said Squall as the doors closed behind them.  The South Hall of Philosophers, between the large pillars that were interspersed throughout, was filled with people all dressed in roughly the same way, involving white robes and, if there was any hair at all, a beard that suggested the person had been caught in the midst of eating a sheep.

                "Djinni of Jupiter!" one called.

                "Venus help me," muttered another.  "Ibsilon, what's the word?"

                "We're supposed to be judging her, according to Judge Griphis," called one of the many philosophers.  He stood by the door, reading a parchment delivered by a soldier.  "'Parently he got a bit testy in the court.  …Um… any of you know what 'Megraghgah' means?"

                "That's probably me," Meg volunteered.

                "Doesn't look half-orc to me," said a voice in the robed crowd.

                "Got the eyes," said another.

                "Lots of Mars Adepts have reddish eyes."

                "Verden, you freak me out.  First 'what's so beautiful about truth', now divining the elements of strangers.  Jupiter Adepts simply were never meant to be philosophers.  You can figure out a counter-argument before the other fellow's finished deciding what his first point is."

                "All right, what's so bad about you that made Griphis get all snippy?" asked Ibsilon, rolling up the parchment and pocketing it.  "Probably not the usual sort of offence.  You don't even look Naribi, really."

                "I might have been.  A very long time ago," Meg replied.

                "Where _are_ you from, then?" asked the same man who had asked for the protection of the Venus Spirit earlier.  Meg turned and fixed on hi the sort of stare that would make butter melt out of sheer intimidation.

                "The wilds," she replied.

                "What, like nomadic?  Tribal sort of people?"

                "No, just me.  And Squall.  We live in the Kandorean Cliffs and keep ingrates like you out of trouble with monsters," she snapped.

                "And occasionally drink blood," said someone who had been smart enough to take the precaution of standing in the back, behind a pillar.

                "You dislike us, but protect us-" began Ibsilon.

                "No, I like people and hate cities," Meg corrected him.

                "Interesting philosophy," said Verden, Really Freaky Philosopher of Jupiter.  "Tell me more about your weltanschauung." 

                "That's no way to talk to a lady," snapped Ibsilon.

                "And if you do it again, _your_ weltanschauung is probably the first thing her swords are going to aim for," said another.

                "It means 'world view', you idiots," said Meg, who hadn't looked offended.  "It's old Attekan."

                "She's good," said Verden appraisingly.  "Anyway, keep talking.  We _are_ supposed to be judging you, after all."

                Meg glared at him, but in the end, had little choice except to talk.  She didn't doubt that they would wait for a very long time, and in any case, that thief was just going to get farther ahead the longer they were stuck in Naribwe.

                If Cian had any sense, he'd be getting the girls and the horse back on the road already, but she suspected that such sense was short among Lemurians.  They had sealed and reopened the island so many times over the centuries (from what Meg remembered of what she had been taught before leaving the city she was born in) that a few Kibombo tribes were said to use it to mark the passing of ages, like the world's slowest clock.

                In short, the chances were about ten in ten that he was still dutifully waiting outside, not wanting to abandon Meg after she had saved them so recently.  Well, then.  Best not to disappoint.

                "The problem with cities," Meg began, "is that they warp the mind and dull the sixth sense.  That'd be _common sense, in case you were wondering.  Cities are built, taking the land and shaping it into what people think is the best place for them to live.  But you box yourselves in with roads and walls and houses, and soon you're all thinking in straight lines, no diversion to one side or the other, and above all never __up.  You don't appreciate orders and cycles that you can't always see every part of.  Nature, on the other hand, is the greatest of all cities, one in which all creatures are not equal, but unequal __in ways that cancel out.  You yourselves, great thinkers to a man -and I might add that the quality of thought that comes out of this place might be improved with the addition of a woman or two, just a thought- are still answerable to this judge who lost his temper just because I turned out to not be a monstrous abomination, but instead just someone who doesn't much like people like him.  In the wild, you would be masters, finding solutions and advantages, and he would listen to you, because he couldn't.  Instead, you find yourselves submissive, because this is a city, where the people who manipulate the best rise to power.  Trees and stones and Wolfkin cannot be intimidated or manipulated.  And the wilds have their own souls, I assure you.  Beyond the walls of the city, the world lives and breathes, lives, dies, and is born again, a hundred thousand cycles and order to the world that you have shut out because it's all too much to control.  I don't control.  I am a part of it and nothing more.  But in the same, I am nothing less."_

                She went on.

                Nearly an hour after the doors had closed in Cata's face, she was still sitting in the sun against the wall, waiting for something to happen and wondering if Meg was even going to get out alive.  Elys was pacing up and down the street, which was dusted in such fine sand that she looked more like she was gliding on a small cloud, and Cian had gone to find Zak.

                Heralded by a rhythm of clopping hooves, the Lemurian appeared around the corner of a nearby sidestreet, horse in tow.  Zak was apparently in his favourite mode, 'I-told-you-so'.

                "It's not like it was unexpected.  Bringing Meg into the city?  I could have told you this would happen.  Tell you one thing, you'll never find horses turning against an unfamiliar horse just because they've heard stories about him."

                "Horses rarely tell stories.  Most of them aren't capable of it," Cian pointed out, waving to Cata and Elys.

                "Even those who can't wouldn't, no matter the circumstance," Zak insisted.

                "I'm going to restock your saddlebags with spare horseshoes if you don't shut up."

                "Oh _yes_.  Dumb animal, won't understand anything but threats, can't be reasoned with-" 

                "Lead ones."  Zak was silent.  "Anything?" he asked, approaching the symposium hall.

                "Other than some fine pacing demonstrations, no," Cata replied.  But, in convenient literary tradition, the hall's massive wooden doors creaked open a bit at that moment.  A moment later, Ibsilon fell out, looked absolutely exhausted and generally shaken.  He pulled himself upright, using Cian as a support all the way, and then grabbed him by the collar.

                "Innocent.  Completely innocent," he reported, eyes wild and hair wilder.  "She is welcome, in fact _encouraged_ to leave, and you will be supplied with horses for the remaining leg of your journey to the Kibombo border.  Just make sure she stays with you, all right?  She's not to come back to Naribwe.  Ever.  _Ever_, do you hear me?"

                "Yes," Cian assured him, removing the philosopher gently but forcefully.  "Where is she?"

                "Right here," said Meg, opening the door the rest of the way (another philosopher, his support removed, toppled onto the steps leading to the hall's entrance).

                "What happened?" asked Elys.

                "A spirited debate on the morality and psychology inherent to city life," Meg reported.

                "Any casualties?" asked Cata, thinking she knew what Meg meant.

                "I'm really rather surprised that these are the best thinkers they've got.  Most of them lost their voices after twenty minutes," said Meg, looking back at the prone figure on the steps.

                "More of shock than exhaustion," Ibsilon muttered.

                "Best be moving on," said Meg.  She waved a scroll.  "We're supposed to take this to the city stable yards.  Very fast horses, I'm assured."  The five travellers headed off down the street; they had passed the stable yards on the way from the Hall of Justice.

                "The woman could incite a hive of bees to rebel against the queen," Ibsilon muttered.  And as they turned down another street, he had the strangest feeling that he had just been part of a story that would spread across the world.  It was an odd one, but it passed soon enough, and he went back inside, looking for someone to argue aesthetics with.  Something nice and safe and not at all to do with living in caves.

                The horses were fast, true to the Naribian's word.  Zak didn't much like travelling with other horses who didn't speak, but while the miles were pounded behind them, crossing the plains between the Narib region and Kibombo territory, he forgot about conversation anyway.  They were nearly finished.  As soon as a single Kibombo guard had been told, the drumsong would echo from Tear River to the edge of the Great Eastern Sea, and all the border would be on guard.  The Kibombo liked Daila.  It was quiet, didn't try to invade them, and were often generous with their harvest, in the interests of keeping those things mutual.  Jastyx didn't have a chance of crossing the alerted border.

                But Zak, as has already been shown, tends to be cynical about these things.  He knows that rarely is anything as simple as it seems.  Life isn't neat.  So he wasn't too surprised, when Naribwe was hours behind them and the mountains were close, to see that the guards were more active than most sentries.  Something was Up.  Drums were sounding in the distance.

                "Not more of you people," said an exasperated guard, his Kibombo accent thick but easy to understand.  "It is not yet trading season.  The border is closed to all uninvited outsiders."

                "What do you mean by 'more'?" demanded Cata.

                "Drumbeat," replied the guard, and gestured to the east.  "Someone was trying to get through the mountains at Spearshaft Pass.  She was turned away, naturally."  The five travellers breathed a uniform sigh of relief.  Then the drums picked up, a rapid sequence that seemed to startle the Kibombo.

                "A struggle," the guard translated.  "Rarely do people dare to test the strength of the mighty Kibombo.  We shall have a new example for all those who would…"  The guard trailed off, and they noticed that the drums had stopped, too.

                "What is it?" asked Meg.

                "It was saying 'three have been felled'.  But the last word was unfinished…" said the guard, a look of controlled horror on his face.  "The border has been breached…  How could anyone…?"

                Cata, Elys, and Cian, who had fought Jastyx only a day ago, were well aware of how someone, Jastyx in particular, could.  Most of the answers involved rocks and a large, ghostly scythe.

                "We are pursuing the very intruder who has just now entered your territory.  Let us through and she will be caught and removed from Kibombo, you have my word," said Cian.

                "She?" repeated the guard, adjusting his headdress in what he apparently believed was a manly way.  "You would have me believe that a woman has defeated…"  He suddenly noticed the looks that he was getting from three of the foreign riders, and suddenly found that he _could_ believe it.

                He reached into a pouch and removed a reddish stone disk with an intricately notched design and rough green string threaded in the centre.  "Take this.  You have four days safe passage through Kibombo.  After that, you will be asked to leave.  After you are asked to leave, you will leave. If you do not leave, your body will leave, and your newly freed spirit can do what it pleases."

                "The generosity of the Kibombo is always appreciated," said Cian, bowing slightly and passing the disk to Cata.  They rode into the mountains.

**[Author's Notes]** This chapter is later than it should have been.  You don't want to know why, I assure you.  It involves the demons that live in hard drives.  Anyway, I give credit to the muse, a continuing source of inspiration and motivation, and have reserved a special quantity of credit for anyone who hits that little review button down there.  Next chapter should be 'soon', but we all know what that means.


	4. Embarcaderos

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Four: Embarcaderos**

                Armed with the token Cata insisted on calling the Sacred Rock of Not Getting Skewered, the five Adepts travelled the wide valley between the Kibombo and southern Suhalla mountain ranges freely.  The proud tribesmen were predictable in not letting any of the adventurers into the pass that Jastyx had broken through, but they weren't forensics anyway.  If 'forensic' was even a word on Weyard, it was still certain that none of them knew it.  They were hunting, and again Meg proved useful.

                "I don't much like the land around here, it all slopes in one direction and the plants are all tropical," she commented at one point.  Meg had been checking to make sure they were still following the right tracks, and found a brightly flowered ivy caught on her boots.  "Still, it's better than being stuck back in Naribwe."

                "What do you mean, tropical?" asked Elys.  "We're about thirty feet north of Daila."

                "If you can look at that sun and tell me we're not a long way from home, then you're as blind as an extremely blind thing," said Meg, leaping onto her horse's back.

                "Blind?  If I look straight at the sun I will," Elys replied.

                "You not Will.  You Elys," said Cata, simply.  Zak sighed and began scanning the horizon, muttering 'ramp-shaped rock, need a big ramp-shaped rock' until Cata slapped him lightly across the ear and nodded ahead, telling him to follow Meg.

                They rode continuously as long as there was daylight and then a while longer, breaking their small camp early the next day and going on.  None of the Adepts could imagine how Jastyx was keeping up this insane pace, especially since they were following her tracks, rather than those of any mount.  On the second day of their free passage the Adepts came upon a farmhouse that was mostly intact.

                The 'mostly' part included the house itself -minus the door, and very literally so- and what was essentially a barn.  The fence had been broken in two places, a straight line going from where Jastyx has entered Kibombo toward the northeast.  Along the way there was a splintered gash in the wall of a storehouse, and the aforementioned lack of a front door.  Cata slipped off Zak's back and entered the house warily, the others following.  She stepped quietly and carefully, which made little sense in her own head, considering why she was scared.

                The first floor was all one room, with a large table and fireplace filling most of it.  Shards of wood suggested that bits of the door were now mingled with the remains of a chair that happened to be in the wrong place, as well as a stain on the floor…  Cata kneeled by it and noticed that it was slightly sticky, as well as a shade of red that sent terror through her spine.  Trying to stay calm, she moved quietly upstairs.

                The first intact door they had yet seen was at the top, and Cata opened it as carefully as she could.  On the other side was obviously a bedroom, and in the middle of the floor was a man kneeling over a woman Cata expected was his wife.  He looked up, saw Cata standing there, and barked an infuriated stream of Kibomban, but didn't move against her.

                Below, Cata heard the others enter the house.  "Elys," she called, "I think we could use some of that Mercury goodness up here."

                Jastyx moved like an arrow, sprinting with inhuman speed across the wide valley.  She took no notice of the terrain, took no notice even of what sort of food she was ripping with her teeth as she ran.  It was a relief to use even this part of her available power, a joy she had been forced to avoid while in true Adept territory.  The Kibombo were generally not powered, and wouldn't notice her except as a blur.

                _What is this? demanded the voice, like the growling of a great beast morphed into words._

                "What?" she growled back.

                _You were not given such permission._

                "It's safe here," Jastyx insisted.

                _You follow my orders at all times.  That is our covenant.  My power is yours to harness, your actions are mine to direct._

                "Don't speak to me like a mere underling-"

                _You are_ an underling!  As are all compared to me!  You are a minion, and while you may be useful to me, do not make the mistake of thinking yourself my equal.__

                The pounding of her feet against the ground was simply a faint beat in the back of her mind.  Jastyx did not notice the passing of miles.  She was focused on the voice, the one that became so clear whenever she reached into this power.

                _Now, continue as I command you and we shall see how far you can go.  Already your past and old name are irrelevant, so much greater are you now.  Do not risk this single chance at your full potential._

                It was gone then, the first time it had ever left Jastyx while she called on greater powers.  She bit into whatever food she held again.  Its nature was not important, only the fact that it was needed to keep going.  The first step was nearing completion.

                Cata stood outside of the farmhouse, along with Zak and Meg.  Meg was searching for signs that it was definitely Jastyx who had cut through the place, since Cian hadn't yet managed to get much coherent out of the farmer, as he didn't quite understand the region's dialect.  Cata was doing her best to help, largely by staying out of the way, and Zak was proving to the universe that he could be just as stubborn as any oh-so-intelligent biped.

                "So," he said to Cian's new horse, "ever been to Micastle?"  The horse didn't even acknowledge him.  "They have some incredible orchards there.  Really.  Apples the size of my hoof."  This didn't appear to impress the new horse any more than any of Zak's other conversational gambits so far.

                "I don't think he's just quiet, Zak," Cata commented.  Zak ignored her nearly as well as his almost-friend was ignoring him.

                "I visited the city just a few years ago.  Went down with her father on some trading convoy.  We were there during the harvest, too.  To tell you the truth, I met an amazing filly down there, but her mare didn't think much of horses from out of town, and that bloody colt followed us everywhere."  Zak was shaking his head, lost in distant memories.  Cian's horse had wandered over to the wrecked wall of the storehouse and struck its head inside, looking for loose fruit.

                Elys walked out, brushing her hands and looking around for a source of water before remembering and washing her hands the Mercury Adept way.  "That's it.  She's okay, no deep wounds and not much blood lost.  Probably just in the way when Jastyx blasted the door down."

                "Probably?  I take it Cian's not having much luck," said Cata.

                "Apparently they structure sentences the wrong way, or something.  For a couple of minutes, he thought the guy was using 'applesauce' as a verb," Elys reported.

                "They were talking about applesauce?" asked Cata, incredulous.

                "Nope," said Elys, shaking her head sadly.  Before she could explain any more, Cian came out of the house in a bit of a rush.  He looked around to see that everyone was still there (in Zak's case, this was more a formality, since he was basically a few years in the past and many miles away at the moment) before speaking.

                "Which way does the trail point?" asked the Lemurian.

                "Northeast," Meg reported.  "Straight as an arrow from Tisiphone."

                "Good.  We're going northwest," Cian replied.

                "Sounds about right," Meg agreed.  "Loses almost no time and still throws us way off."

                "And gets her well out of the way.  Apparently she doesn't much feel like tangling with us again."

                "What on Weyard are you two talking about?" demanded Cata.

                "The hunter and the artist are discussing the psychology of tracking," muttered Zak.  "And, being heroes, they'll be right, because otherwise I might get to relax some time before the decade's up, and we can't have that, _can we?!_"  This last part was screamed at the sky, and it was a moment before anyone spoke.

                "Where are we going, then?" asked Elys.

                "I managed to get a suggestion out of the farmer.  I think he said that there's a port city to the northwest, a place called Embarcaderos, so I figured we should get back on the trail," said Cian.

                "Why the rush?  We stopped for them, surely they can help us out," Cata suggested.

                "I don't think that'd be a good idea," Cian said, wretchedly, and the others noticed the door-hammering sounds coming from inside the house for the first time.  They stared at the Lemurian, awaiting an explanation.   "Um… I tried to thank him."

                Cata sighed.  "Saddle up."

                While the others made sure everything was packed to continue their journey, Cian extracted his horse from the broken wall and found that he had more than an independent-minded horse to deal with.  There was a conveniently opened box of carrots on the shelf directly below the new window, and its contents were moving.

                Cian drew his sabre and carefully nudged the shifting orange roots.  What followed could best described as the tuber equivalent of a firework, and when the chaos settled, a newly familiar shape was flapping out of the storehouse.

                "'M not late, don't tell me I'm late, I've been flying like mad to find you," said the Jupiter Djinni.

                "Zephyr.  Took you long enough to find me," said Squall, appearing on Meg's shoulder.

                "If you were anywhere near where I expected you to be, this would've been easier.  What insane impulse sent you into Kibombo?" asked Zephyr.

                "My Adept and her new friends.  They're all crazy," Squall added.

                "Good.  I'll fit in."

                "What's going on?" asked Elys.

                "Oh, not you, entirely unsuitable- ally with a Mercury Adept?  Me?  Not a chance," said Zephyr, looking rather disdainfully at Elys.

                "When things started shaking up back at the Kandorean Cliffs, I called to any Jupiter Djinn in the area.  It's not a wide range, mind you, so I wasn't sure anyone would show up," Squall explained.

                "And now?" asked Cata.

                "Now, assuming that you're all Adepts and on a mission, which I would guess to be the case, from Squall's explanation, I'll need someone to ally with," said Zephyr.  "Haven't gone adventuring in centuries, this'll be great fun."

                "Y'can't have mine, we'd get a Psynergy imbalance," Squall stated firmly.

                "You're coming along… because you think it'll be fun?" asked Cata.  "I'm not sure we can trust someone who's just along for the-"

                "Hold on," said Zephyr, "you're a Jupiter Adept.  Perfect."

                "…What, me?" said Cata, startled.   She was silent for a moment.  "Still, I suppose we can use all the help we can get."  Elys grinned at her friend slyly.  "What?  It makes sense."

                "Of course it does, Cata," said Elys, patronizingly.

                "Cata, eh?  All right.  **Zephyr allies with Cata!**"  The Djinni spun in the air until she was simply a purple blur, and then spiralled outwards as a trail of Psynergy lights.  They circled Cata, moving closer and then sinking into her skin.

                "How do you feel?" asked Elys, noting the dazed expression on her friend's face.

                "…_Whoa," Cata explained.  A crash came from inside the house, indicating that the farmer had managed to open the door and now intended to pay Cian back for making such a comment about his great-grandmother.  The Lemurian leapt on his horse and kicked it into motion, followed quickly by Elys.  The house's front door slammed open, and Cata had only time to say, in a detached but awed way, "That's a hell of a big scythe" before Meg threw her on Zak's back and rode away herself._

                "Rather good time for me to find you, this," Zephyr commented.  "I think we should be getting away from this place fast, before word spreads.  The farmer's probably got a signal drum."

                "How's that helpful?" asked Cata, returning to reality and holding tight onto Zak's neck.

                "Well, you've got me, haven't you?"

                "And that's going to help?"

                "I _am a Jupiter elemental."_

                "Still waiting for the help."

                Zephyr sighed.  "How do you feel about speaking in the third person?"

                The farmer, far behind them, showed himself to be one of the few Adepts among the Kibombo by hurling Fireball Psynergy into the field around them.  Cata was grateful for the distance they had already put between them and the farm, otherwise she expected they'd have felt more than a rush of hot air from the inaccurate explosions.

                "At the moment, I can handle it," Cata replied quickly.  Zephyr released a rush of information into her new Adept's head, all about how to call on the powers of Djinn.  "…Whoa.  Cool.  Okay, here goes: _Unleash Zephyr!"_

                The glowing spirit of a Jupiter Djinni floated up in front of Cata's face.  "_That's the way._"  Then she burst into a cloud of purple lights that swirled past the Adepts and their horses like rings of shining wind, and suddenly the ground was blasting away beneath them.

                After a few minutes and as many miles, while the Adepts got used to the rush of sudden speed, Elys looked over at Meg.  "Is this northeast?"  The huntress sighed and called for Cian's attention.

                "You're late, I believe."

                "I'm precisely on time."

                "Being assaulted in the cliffs didn't slow you down?"

                "I made up for it on the plains."

                "You know you weren't supposed to do that."

                "Don't give me any of your lip."

                "So obviously exclusionary?  You'd no doubt accept it if it were Deo's."

                "Don't even speak that name.  What of yourself?"

                "Successful, naturally."

                "A ship, then."

                "You need not leave.  I returned early and already have our transport."

                "Then why are we still standing here?"

                "I enjoy the atmosphere."

                "That's odd.  I can't smell blood."

                "You wound me."

                "So I wish every day."

                Embarcaderos was unusual, since it was in Kibombo territory but nothing like their proud tribal kingdom.   The place was a port city, established more by foreigners than natives, and most of the buildings were of Osenian or even Lemurian style, rather than Kibombo.  There was, of course, a massive market district, where a person with enough coins could buy nearly anything made anywhere on Weyard, as well as the services to have it repaired (or, if searching for something that wasn't made anywhere else, built).

                The travellers stood in the plaza of Embarcaderos, down a sandy street from the main gate.  People milled around them, not taking more than passing interest in the odd group aside from Meg's swords, which caused a fair number of Embarcaderans to make a wide arc around the plaza's centre.

                "Anything?" asked Cian.

                "I couldn't possibly follow a trail in a city like this.  I'm no wolf," said Meg.

                "What about Psynergy?  Shouldn't we be able to sense her like that?" asked Elys.

                "Plenty of Venus Adepts out here," Zak pointed out, pawing the sand distastefully.  It always got into his tail and mane.  All he had to do was look at the stuff.

                "Jastyx was nasty," Cata countered.  "We ought to be able to sense something malevolent about her Psynergy, shouldn't we?  No normal person can call up Death whenever she wants."

                "We're assuming that she's still on land," Cian remarked.  "I doubt a thief would bother crossing the Kibombo border and going this far just to hide in a port city."

                "Anyone who'd give her a ship would need to be blind, deaf, and none too swift," muttered Cata.

                "We should ask around," said Elys.  "Find the docks and talk to people.  You're right on one part, Cata, they'll remember anyone who looked like Jastyx."

                "'M right on all of them," she grumbled.

                The docks were easy enough to find, being in a small bay at the seaside edge of the city.  Many ships were moored, others were coming in or leaving or unloading cargo.  While the sailors tended to be gruff at first, they softened just a bit when seeing Cata or Elys, and to the point of jelly when seeing Meg, her hands comfortably resting on the hilts of her blades.

                "Ach, I remember such a strange one as yer describin'," one of them admitted.  "Yer not too late after her, either, she was just here an hour or so ago."

                "Even with Zephyr helping us, she got here first?" demanded Cata, feeling that if thieves are going to cheat than there's little point in chasing them to begin with.

                "What are a zeffer?" asked a sailor who looked to be at least half-dwarf.  Not many people knew of the strange, stone-loving people of northwest Angara, but Cian remembered them from long ago with a smile at the amiably mangled grammar of the region.

                "Where is she now?" asked Cian quickly, not enjoying the thought of Djinni-inspired commotion.

                "Took off with some cowled fellow, di'n she, Torrin?" said the first sailor.

                "Glad ter see th' both of 'em off, too," added the short and solid Torrin.  "Looked like they were heading for Lemuria, te tell ye the truth."

                "Lemuria?" repeated Cian, suddenly very worried.

                "Aye, yer homeland, I'd suppose.  Are ye worried?  I wouldna be, even if those two were trouble.  The Lemurians can and 'ave taken on many the invader over the centuries, and plenty of them have seen quite a few o' those centuries themselves."

                "Two.  Not good," said Elys.

                "Double the fun," Cata countered.

                "You aren't human," Zak muttered, and wandered over to wait in some of the sun-baked city's rare shade.  They'd find him when it was time to go, and he didn't intend to hang around sailor who hadn't likely seen much fresh meat recently.

                "The woman is a thief, carrying the Sea God's Tear from the sanctum of Daila.  It is imperative that we catch up with her and retrieve the tear immediately, or our home will suffer," said Cian.

                "Ach, we'd be pleased te help ye, but our ship just docked today, and we won't set out for a week or more," said Torrin's friend.

                "People could die in that time!" said Elys, fury building.

                "There's nothin' either of us can do te change it, lass," said Torrin, a bit wretchedly.

                "Oh, don't call her 'lass'," muttered Cata.  Torrin heard this, or at least caught the basic meaning, and thought quickly as he felt the air begin to grow cold.  To tell the truth, there was no good reason not to call Elys 'lass', but Cata was going by literary tradition here, and _everyone_ knows that the most powerful spellcasters always have something that sets them off.  Torrin was included in that.

                "Check in there," said the half-dwarf, pointing without much shaking down the street to a tavern.  "Padriac's a good man, and makes trips to Lemuria all the time.  Could be he'd be willing for an unscheduled one."

                "How can we find him?" asked Meg, always on the lookout for the advantage in a hunt.

                "He's got a bit o' yer friend's heritage in 'im.  Could be why he likes the place so much," said Torrin's friend, gesturing at Cian.  "Not many blue-haired folks about."

                This seemed reasonable, but when the door swung open onto a heavily shadowed room, Cata would have preferred that this captain glowed in the dark.  There were windows, though, and after a short time their eyes adjusted to the dark -Meg's did so almost instantly- and they saw a man sitting at a table by himself, removed from the bar and the other patrons.

                They approached him, and Elys was the first to hazard, "Are you Padriac?"

                Slowly the man looked up at them, showing a rough and amused face beneath thick dark hair that might have been blue, but looked black in the darkness.  "If you were hoping to impress me with your unnatural cunning, you're going about it entirely the wrong way."

                "Is that a yes or a no?" asked Meg, and in the dimness steel glinted.

                "That's a bit more on the showy side there, thank you," said the man who was apparently Padriac.  "I do prefer proper caution on the part of strangers, it lets them live longer.  You've met me now, then, the famous eighth-Lemurian captain of the Great Eastern Sea.  Is there more?"

                "Eighth-Lemurian?  That's not exactly impressive," Cata pointed out.

                "More than anyone else in here," he replied, and drank again from a bottle that was no doubt quite lonely until the captain surrounded it with a few friends..

                "Not quite," said Cian, stepping with impossible timing so that a ray of light from one of the narrow windows shone on his blue hair and glinted off one golden eye.

                "Oh, very nice.  Don't see enough of that these days.  Now, do you want something or are you just looking for a little adventure?  I've got no time for "  Padriac seemed to be trying for a solid, mildly inquisitive gaze, but he was a little unsteady and didn't seem to be keeping focus.

                "I think we'd prefer help from someone less drunk," Cata remarked.

                "One day a year," said Padriac to no one in particular.  "Just one, at the end of the season, when all the little merchants have brought their goods to Embarcaderos or Champoshi  or Alhafra and don't need to go anywhere until the dry season.

                "If we don't get to Lemuria and catch Jastyx, Daila's never going to _have_ a dry season," Elys growled quietly.  She glared at the captain.  "You're no help then.  Let's go, Cata."

                "Just one day when all the memories aren't so bad, when the fangs go blurry and the claws are dull, when the fires don't burn and the screams don't pierce.  Like a vacation.  And then the next season begins, and I keep steady for another year," Padriac went on.

                "What are you talking about?" asked Cata, more softly.  "What memories?"

                The captain looked at her owlishly and finished the bottle.  "'M not going to tell you an'thin'.  Sherves ye right for looki… ng in m' head an'way.  Leave ye t' _stew_."

                "I didn't look in your head.  I've never bothered learning Mind Read," Cata assured him.

                "Why are you even bothering with this dreg?" demanded Elys.  "There's got to be someone actually _helpful_ going to Lemuria."

                "Goin'… te Lemuryah?" asked Padriac, who was in rapid decline but certainly not dulled yet.

                "Chasing a thief to save our village," Cata replied.

                "So much like her," Padriac mumbled.  Then his eyes widened.  "Thief?  Thief on th' _ocean_?  _Pirates?"  He leapt from his chair, carefully not tipping a single bottle on the table._

                "Well, not exactly pi-" Cata began.

                "PIRATES!" he raged, then stumbled backwards, clutching at his head.  "Oh, Spirits… Th' might call it Cure, but it'll never cure this…"

                "What's going on?" asked Elys.

                "Um…" Cian hesitated, a little embarrassed.  "Not many people know, since it's not common, but Lemurians go from normal to drunk to hung over very quickly.  Just one critical level and it all starts."  Elys sighed.

                "I suppose you still want his help," she said, looking at Cata.  The look was returned.  "Oh, very well.  _Restore."  Blue sparkles spun around the captain and suddenly he found that standing up straight wasn't so hard._

                "What _nature of pirates are we talking about here?" waving his hands aimlessly._

                "I though you Restored him," Cata whispered.

                "I am _not drunk, though I _have_ been accused of such _more_ than once," said Padriac.  His voice was like the waves- it fell and rose with a regular rhythm that was both strange and sort of soothing at the same time.  "Don't ask, just tell me how the pirates fit into this and what you want."_

                "There aren't any pirates-" Cata began.

                "But at best she's just never found her true calling," Cian explained.

                "At the bottom of the ocean," Meg was quick to add.

                "She's stolen the Sea God's Tear from Daila, and unless we get it back, the entire village could be destroyed.  I won't let that happen, and I don't intend to let anyone else let it happen either," Elys growled.

                "I'm inclined to go along with her," Padriac whispered to Cian, who was standing closer.

                "That would probably be the healthiest choice," Cian agreed.

                "Very well, _let's talk terms.  __I will take you to Lemuria, __you will catch this thief, and __I will take all of you __back to the mainland.  You can go __home with your Tear, and the _thief_ is mine to deal with, _as_ I see fit."  The entire time Padriac gestured as though conducting an orchestra of words, ending with his arms dramatically wide._

                "Why do you get the thief?" asked Cata.

                "Because above all else I hate evil pirates," Padriac told her, with more of a steel tongue than a silver one.  "They make my soul twitch."

                "And that's hell for me," said no one.

                "What?" asked Meg.

                "Do we _have a contract or _not_?" the captain insisted._

                "I don't like the idea of leaving anyone's fate in your hands if you hate them that much.  Somehow I suspect that the sea doesn't breed forgiving people," Cata replied.

                "Hah, true enough," Padriac replied, a bit gruff.  "But I hate the idea of letting them walk free even more.  Very well.  We go to Lemuria, bag the pirates, and then we can have a nice chat about what to do with them, savvy?  It's more fun when they can hear you talking about it anyway."

                "This is not the safest-looking ship I've ever seen," Cian commented.

                "I am _not getting on that thing!  This is exactly what I was talking about when we left!  No boats, no water, no way!" Zak spluttered, slowly being dragged toward the dock._

                Elys had to agree with the Lemurian's view.  The ship's hull was scarred and less than smooth, and the deck was rather severely lacking in safety equipment… among other things.

                "No sail?" Meg queried.  "How did you get a Lemurian ship?"

                "This _isn't Lemurian," Padriac replied, "nor a __common ship.  It's mine."  He was roaming the deck, apparently checking up on whatever it was he needed to check on before setting out.  Now that they were out in the sunlight, the others could see Padriac more clearly.  He was taller and even more broad-shouldered than Cian, with a mass of bluish-black hair in a bit of a tangle, and his eyes were golden brown, showing a little of his Lemurian blood.  "And __not an easy thing to build, I _might_ point out."_

                "And I pray we never have to do such a thing again," said the same no one.

                "All right, what was that?" demanded Cata.  "I was watching that time, you didn't speak."

                "You haven't figured it out yet?" asked Zephyr, appearing in the air near her.

                "They're slow on the uptake, I've found," Squall remarked.

                "Djinn," Padriac mumbled, seeing Zephyr's appearance.  "There's more to you than I believed."

                "I hope this means I can come out now," said a sudden spark of blue, "because I don't intend to stay in there any longer than necessary.  Blasted cities."  A Mercury Djinn was now perched on Padriac's shoulder, glaring at the newly-boarded Adepts as if daring them to make comment.

                "That's… Mercury?" said Elys, uncertain but intrigued.

                "I'm Hail, welcome aboard the _Tide Raven.  If you don't like waves, stay belowdecks.  If you want to earn your passage, stay up top, and I'll find something for you to do," the Djinni told them.  She turned to Padriac.  "Was that polite enough?"_

                "You're getting better," the captain admitted.

                "Good.  That's enough of that for one day, then."

                "So, how do you-" Cata began, but Hail whipped around to glare at her.

                "Avast, me hearties, we got one that talks!  Ye'd best be makin' it quick, girl, or it's the brig for you!  Stowaways don't fare well on the _Tide Raven_!" shouted Hail.

                "Erk," Cata finished, not moving.

                "Don't do that," Padriac admonished the Djinni.

                "Arr, captain, ye can't be lettin' the landlubbers ta speak freely on the-"

                "Miss Hail!  Anchors aweigh, oars at the ready, let us move out!" barked Padriac.

                "Aye-aye, sir!" Hail barked back, saluted with her pincer-tail, and leapt off his shoulder, speeding over to the grille in the middle of the deck and leaping through to check on the oar mechanisms.

                "It's just the two of you on this one ship?" asked Meg.  "I wouldn't claim to know much about sailing, but I was pretty sure most people used things like crews to make it all work."

                "_Right you are, and you may find that I __do ask you for some assistance at __one point or another, but I _made_ this ship myself, and _not_ without a few tricks," Padriac replied.  With that, he stepped up to the helm -a much-ornamented wheel with a purple crystal at its hub- and pushed it into one full spin.  At that, the crystal flared with light, an anchor flew out of the water, landed heavily on the deck, and the _Tide Raven_ drifted away from the dock._

                "This should be good," Elys whispered, looking on.

                "Tell me when we're about to crash, I don't want to be conscious for it," Zak grumbled, and headed for the way down into the hold.

                "Lemuria, then," Padriac murmured, spinning the wheel again, and the ship turned in the cove, facing the open ocean.  "Yo ho."  The crystal pulsed again, and the ship surged forward.

                "I thought he said this wasn't Lemurian," Meg stated, trying to steady herself against the uneven push and slow of the ship as it gained speed.

                "It's not," replied Elys, looking over the side with a touch of amazement in her voice.  The others made their way over, occasionally jumping over a rope or other obstacle, and peered over the side.  Giant, ghostly green wings rippled out from the ship's prow, pushing the water behind them and fading away to be replaced by another set.  After a minute, the _Tide Raven was speeding through the waves, and they were on the way to Lemuria._

                "I hate evil pirates," Padriac said again to no one in particular.  "They always gave the rest of us a bad name."

**[Author's Notes]**  That was longer than expected.  Still next chapter will be good, as more than one new thing is explained, further Djinn make themselves known, and Jastyx's partner is revealed to be… rather familiar.  By the way, for those trying to put a time to this… I've made it intentionally difficult, and it's just going to get worse.  *evil grin*  Oh, and of course, my thanks to the muse for various forms of help, not the least of which being the concentration required to write one of these things.  Now go review, it's good for you.


	5. The Heart of Poseidon

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter 5: Heart of Poseidon**

                "Arr!  Ye'll be swabbin' faster or it's the plank and the sharks fer ye, missy!" shouted Hail, hopping from ropes to the yard-arm before dropping onto the deck again.  Cata paused in her efforts under the blazing sun and glared at the Djinni.

                "Remind me again why we need to wash the deck.  I mean, it's all water, right?  Can't we just sail into a big wave and save the effort or something?" she demanded, leaning on the mop.

                "Typical simplification of an element you don't understand," Elys remarked, leaning over the rail to feel the spray of the sea.

                "And as glad as I am that I wasn't picked," Meg added, carrying a crate up from belowdecks, "I'd hardly call a Jupiter Adept ideal for a washer."

                "Bah!  The farm girl needs ta be building some muscles on that feath'ry frame!" Hail shot back.

                "Muscles?" demanded Cata.  In a flicker of purple, she dashed across the ship and leapt onto the upper level, picking Hail up and shaking her.  "I've being ploughing, sowing, reaping, and above all else hauling massive quantities of vegetables since I could walk!  Don't tell me I need muscles!"

                "Legumes are not known for inducing strength," said Hail in an entirely different voice- equally cold, but now possessed of a sort of cold aristocracy.

                "I'm not sure what kind of food builds brain mass, either, but it seems you could do with some!"  Cata would have gone on, but at that moment the wet planks beneath her were (temporarily, in the hot sun) covered in a layer of frost, and she was dropped backwards onto the main deck.

                "Please do _not manhandle my Djinni, _or_ I'll have to reconsider our _deal_," Padriac warned her, still keeping a watch on the sea as they sped towards Lemuria.  "Those pirates __still haven't had their __fate decided."_

                "And ye'd best be rememberin' that Djinn don't eat!" added Hail.

                Cata looked over at Zephyr, perched on the bucket.  "She's right," the Jupiter Djinni admitted.

                "It's getting cloudier," Meg noted, looking up at the slowly greying sky.  "And there's a mist in the air.  The whole thing's really quite repulsive."

                "Mars Adepts are simply not delicate enough to appreciate real beauty," Squall muttered.  Meg looked at her own Djinni, not impressed.  Squall was one of the stronger-willed Djinn, though, and didn't flinch as she returned the look.

                Cian appeared on deck, apparently having finished whatever task Hail had thrown on him in the hold.  He looked around and took a deep breath, an expression of serene satisfaction on his face.  "Home," the Lemurian whispered, luxuriating in the smell.  "The water and the earth…"

                "Carried on the breeze," Cata commented, innocently.

                "Yes, yes, I've got the idea, 'Mars isn't welcome here'.  I didn't ask to go along with this insanity, I might point out.  I just didn't have anywhere to go from Naribwe except the same way as you," Meg pointed out, rather irritated.

                "Of course you're welcome, Meg, we owe you a lot after that battle in the cliffs," said Cata.

                "You're assuming I _want to be welcome," she grumbled, but it was just bluster now._

                "I'm not _exactly welcome myself, o lady of the __exceptionally disturbing swords," Padriac remarked.  He had seen Meg's wicked fighting style during a lull in Hail's work-inventing creativity; she had sparred with Cian to ease her mounting hunter frustration, and it was obviously her own choice that the Lemurian was still a single, solid individual._

                The mist wrapped around the _Tide Raven swiftly and silently, dulling the sounds of the surrounding sea, and in the clouds ahead a dark shape began to form.  Though the Seal of the Ocean hadn't been placed on the island, Lemuria was still by nature a foggy place, and the weather that day was at least getting into the adventurous spirit._

                "Been a very long time," Cian said, still to himself.

                "You probably expected better circumstances," Cata suggested, but the Lemurian simply turned and grinned.

                "I'll take what I can get.  Let's get the Sea God's Tear back."  

                It had been long enough that none of the Adepts wondered about the cave docks, but if they had the simple explanation would have been that, along with the spire walls, whirlpools, deadly currents, and blinding fog, the caves were part of the protective Seal that the Lemurians raised in times of danger.  Now, though, the island was open, and though the mists of the day still veiled them, the sun could still be seen, a patch of brightness in the sky.

                The _Tide Raven slipped easily into dock and Padriac gave the wheel another seemingly carefree spin, at which the Psy Crystal in its centre went out and the ships 'wings' stopped rowing.  There were others at port, but only a few Lemurians about keeping an eye on things, and none of them though the appearance of another trading vessel strange._

                "We should be back soon," Cata told the captain as she walked down to the dock.

                "If we're not, we probably won't be back at all anyway," Zak added, following her with his usual level of fatalistic enthusiasm.

                "_Actually… if you're interested, I __do think I could be of _some_ help to you," Padriac offered._

                "Do you really want to take on a ruthless thief or two?" Elys asked.

                "I _told you already, I do so _hate_ evil pirates," Padriac repeated.  "And I'd _hardly_ be defenceless, I promise you _that_, especially with Hail."  The Djinni in question followed her Adept down onto solid ground and glared at the others for good measure._

                "Arr, ye've never seen me wrath unleashed proper, 'ave ye?  It's a sight everyone sh'd see once in their lives- plenty o' dead men already have!"  Hail laughed in the style of a pirate who finds her own joke riotously funny, particularly with the worried expressions of those around her factored in.

                "Don't get _too worried, she's never killed _anyone_," Padriac assured them, but added quietly a moment later: "…As far as I know."  They all looked at Hail for a moment, and she returned the stares with a tilted expression of anticipation.  "Furthermore," the captain went on, shaking them out of it, "I _haven't_ ever actually _seen_ Lemuria beyond these docks, and I _think_ it's about time I did something _more_ for these people than bring them _another_ blasted load of merchants."_

                "You'll be ready for a battle?" asked Cata.

                "If it comes to that," Cian added.

                "Oh, I hope so," said Meg.

                "You'll get it," Zak told her.

                "How do you know?"

                "That's exactly what I'm hoping to avoid," the horse muttered.  "Look, why am I even here?  We just had to cross a sea, and horses aren't meant for water, and now we're on land, but it's a really small one and I know you're not going to need to get anywhere far away all that fast."

                "You're here," Cata replied, heading up the hill to the Lemurian docks centre as Padriac tied the ship, "because we're going after a really nasty individual and need all the help we can get, because I know I can rely on you even if you don't want to, and because you were afraid that they'd eat you if we left you in the stables at Embarcaderos with the rest of the horses."

                "True, but does that revoke my right to complain?" asked Zak.

                "I'm starting to envision steaks even when I'm not hungry," Meg muttered.  "I wonder why."

                "You're sick."

                "At least I'm not a horse who's convinced he can talk," the huntress shot back.

                "What do you mean, 'convinced'?  You can hear me just fine.  I've been talking to people for years," said Zak, shaking his head in annoyance.  He looked at Meg.  "Well?  Nothing to say?"  She didn't acknowledge him.  "Elys, can you do something about her?  Elys?  Elys, can you hear me?  _Elys!"_

                Ignoring the commotion behind her, Cata reached the crest of the hill and looked out at Lemuria.  Some called it the Crown of the Ocean, others the Island of Lost Ages, and still other, less respectful people, the Realm of Those Blue-Haired Freaks.  It was a great city, reaching into the cloudy distance, filled with beautifully shaped grey stone buildings and pillars, many covered in deep-green ivy or decorated with fountains that seemed to fill the air with streams of diamonds.

                And there were people, oh yes.  The streets were scattered with Lemurians of every kind, from tiny children to their nine hundred year old great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmothers.  The many people all shared two things, despite their other differences: blue hair and eyes of bright gold (though even these were occasionally streaked with another hue).

                "Lemuria is at your service," a woman announced, stepping out of the docks centre and noticing Cata staring in awe at the great city.  Cata turned and bowed in what she hoped was proper Lemurian style.

                "I'm not sure we need any service…" Cata replied.

                "Go ahead, they can tell us where to look," said Cian, coming up behind her.

                "Are you sure?" asked Meg, very quietly.

                "Of course we can trust Lemurians," Padriac told her.  "If they ever _got really insulted by anything, she'd __probably be insulted that you _thought_ otherwise."_

                "I'm getting really tired of the immortal-and-blindingly-pristine-demigodly Lemurian image ," Meg grumbled.

                "In that case, I'll have to take you by the Senate later on," the woman said cheerfully.  "You might feel better, unless you decide then that we're hypocrites."  Meg stared for a moment, then decided she was probably joking, and laughed.  "Now then, how can I help?"

                As they had confirmed in Embarcaderos, Jastyx -and her apparent new companion- was easy to remember, partially because so many people tried to forget meeting her.  After explaining their pursuit to the Lemurian woman, Helena, she called in the watchguards and quickly pieced their sightings together.

                Helena leaned over a map of the island, tapping points in a line from the coast.  "Pietr saw this Jastyx woman here, Darrow spotted someone who meets the description around here, and then Lyssa caught sight of them along Lumini Street…  I don't like this.  You're sure these are thieves you're following?"

                "I saw the Sea God's Tear in her hands," Cata growled.  "We've followed them all the way from Daila, and now it's time to exact a bit of enthusiastic justice."

                "I hope you're quick about it.  They're heading for the old undertemple.  The Lemurian Ruins.  No one goes in there by the command of the Senate, but I wouldn't be surprised if they've got something planned.  No Venus Adept -even one as powerful as you say- would dare try to hide on Lemuria."

                "Then we'd better be quick about it," Meg added.  "If it's a bad place to hide, they probably don't intend to stay for long, either."

                "I'd send a watchguard or two to help-" Helena began.

                "We'll handle this one, don't worry about that," Elys cut in, firmly.

                "But somehow I don't think you'd accept," she finished with a grin.  "Adventurers usually don't like help from the official peacekeepers.  Anyway, more warriors would probably just slow you down."

                "We aren't warriors," said Elys.  "Well, aside from Meg."

                "I'm a hunter," she corrected.

                "And you?" asked Helena, looking at Padriac, who was probably the most rugged of them.

                "Ship captain," he replied.

                "Artist," Cian put in before he could be asked.

                "And Zak's a horse," Cata finished.  Helena blinked.  "He's outside," she added.

                "Of course," said Helena.  She turned to Pietr.  "Take them to the ruins, let them inside, and don't let anyone else out unaccompanied."

                "Or at least conscious," Elys murmured.

                The name 'undertemple' was more apt than the Adepts expected.  A quick canal trip took them to the northwestern coast of Lemuria in a few moments, and the land there sloped down in a series of natural terraces, like stairs for a giant, or a dragon.  Or a giant dragon.  Something huge, anyway.

                Pietr led them down these to a point about halfway between the crest and the water's edge.  They found an ornate door there with pillars on either side and friezes of Lemurians casting Freeze Prism on terrible monsters.  Cian found this ironic.  Meg decided she wasn't going to let the Lemurian people off the hook yet.  But Zak was more intent on the temple itself.

                "The whole thing is underneath the city?" he said, realising the magnitude of the ruins.

                "That would be correct," Pietr agreed, amused but not shocked by that talking horse -evidently a nephew of his had a gull with some level of Psynergy that occasionally joined in conversation.  "But since the core spring started flooding on a regular cycle, we have not used the temple, and it has fallen into disrepair.  It really is a shame, I enjoyed the sculptures quite a lot."

                Elys tapped a column, or rather, the bottom half of it, as the top was a few feet away.  "It's crumbled this much and you remember a time when people still… oh.  Right.  Sorry."

                "Don't worry about it.  Most outsiders forget about the spring water.  Speaking of which, Cian, how are you managing off the island?" the watchguard inquired.

                "I'm still well enough supplied," he said.  "How are you faring _on the island?  I haven't heard much good, and most of it has been about the Senate."_

                "Same thing," Pietr admitted.  "Hydros has been losing influence for a long time, gradually enough that no one stands up and takes notice.  Conservato has been causing trouble again, but not the sort that most of the people see.  If Hydros hadn't declared that 'to keep politicians focused on the good of Lemuria, Senators aren't allowed to hold monarchic office', Conservato would probably be jockeying for kingship."

                "_Fascinating as this is," said Padriac, "and __do take me seriously, I'm part Lemurian myself, I __really think we have something a bit more pressing at hand that we _might_ want to deal with."_

                "Arr, he speaks the truth, and ye'd best be makin' way for the captain o' the _Tide Raven or be ready te have a Djinni-shaped hole put through ye!" agreed Hail._

                "Djinni!" exclaimed Pietr, the first sign he had yet shown that he even had emotions.  "I hope you won't be in any rush to leave after this is solved."

                "Actually, we need to get the Tear back to Daila as fast as possible.  That's the whole reason we're out here.  Without the Sea God's Tear to balance Mercury Psynergy in the region, storms are getting out of control.  I just hope they haven't been flooded already," Elys said fervently.

                "Oh," said Pietr, sounding a bit disappointed.

                "We just go through, do we?" asked Meg.

                "Yes," Pietr responded, slipping back to 'infuriating' Lemurian calm.  "I'll stay here at the entrance.  I promise that no one will pass back through while I stand guard."

                With that assurance, Cata led the way (with Zak, under protest) into the undertemple, Zephyr at her shoulder.  The corridors were low and rather dark, but lined with sculptures and murals carved into aqua-blue stone that shone with the faint glow of the evening ocean.

                "I don't think I ever truly appreciated the meaning of 'dank' before," Cata muttered.

                "I'm with you on that one," Zephyr agreed.

                "I like it," Elys countered.  "It's sort of… comforting.  Safe."

                "A haven for mildew and mold of all kinds," Zak remarked.

                "You're quite cheerful for people heading into mortal combat," observed Padriac.

                "We don't have long to wait, either," said Cian, ignoring Zak's strangled cry.  "The undertemple had- has, I suppose, many chambers that were restricted to all Adepts but a specific class- Ascetic, I think -and there were plenty of things to keep others out."

                "Lemurians don't keep guard monsters, do they?" asked Meg.

                "Not monsters, no.  But there are likely mechanisms, and maybe sentinels," he replied.

                No one asked what sentinels were, in the hopes that whatever they imagined would be much, much worse than reality; sometimes unnamed fears are easier to ignore.  But not too deep into the passages, the Adepts found out precisely what Cian meant by 'mechanism'.

                It was a large hall, with high arches in the same dusky blue stone and statues of heroic Lemurians, tiled in a shade of grey rock that actually managed to be refreshing and dull at the same time.  And just as Elys stepped between the first two statues a voice echoed off the walls.

                "_The one who steps here is no Ascetic.  Is she a guest of Lemuria's undertemple?"  The Adepts froze.  After a moment, Cian decided that he wasn't likely to make the situation worse._

                "Yes?" he answered.

                "_The one who speaks is no Ascetic.  Let one who is-"_

                "Oh, get on with it!" Meg snapped, as still as a crouched lynx but not much enjoying it.

                "_Nor is she.__  Begone or becrushed!"_

                "This is _not quite what I was _expecting_ from a homecoming," Padriac commented._

                "Becrushed isn't even a-" Elys began, but then the meaning became clear.  At the far end of the chamber, tiles flew out of their places in the floor and launched in whirling volleys, turning end over end and descending upon the Adepts.

                Meg was out of range in moments, pressed against the back of a statue's pedestal, and Cata was quick to follow, but Zak, Padriac, and Cian weren't nearly as agile, and Elys was too far out in the open.  She dropped to the floor as a block of stone swept so close it scraped her shoulder.  The others were at least able to avoid the rest of the first wave, but then the floor began pulling itself up in a horizontal avalanche, like a crumbling wall that had fallen over and forgotten about gravity.

                Elys glanced back to see that the others hadn't been hurt at precisely the wrong moment, and a last rock clipped her leg, dropping her to the floor, fatally vulnerable. Cian pulled Zak over to the safety of the opposite statue, but Padriac had other, more insane and more aggressive plans.  

                He had taken the moment's safety to pull on a pair of gauntlets and then ran ahead to Elys.  The slabs spun with lethal force through the air, but the wild captain closed his eyes, breathed deeply once, and when they opened, the light of Psynergy was in them.

                Padriac lashed out with well-forged knuckles, bashing a tile out of the air a moment before impact, then struck another, another and continued the frenzy of shattering as long as possible, but too many minor impacts began to take their toll, and he was forced to change tactics.

                At the next strike, Padriac called out "_Quake Sphere!_"  The stone was blasted into dust by Venus Psynergy, and a wave of power radiated from it, blasting others apart as it grew.  One did manage to avoid devastation, spinning like a massive prototype shuriken, and knocked the captain senseless, but even when she needed help, Elys -as Cata liked to put it- didn't 'do the helpless thing'.

                "_Prism!" A giant chunk of ice coalesced from pure Mercury Psynergy, crashing down in front of the two Adepts under assault and deflecting the rest of the flying stone tiles.  Once the storm was over, Elys let it dissolve into simple power again, and was about to start fixing herself and Padriac when other sounds of struggle began._

                Meg and Cata were only a little surprised when their sheltering statue drew its broad sword and stepped down to the floor, since this was roughly in true adventuring style, and it had been unnecessarily lifelike in their opinion anyway.

                "What do we do to an enemy without flesh, anyway?" asked Cata, ducking a wide sweep.

                "Enjoy the lack of morality inherent to the situation," Meg replied.

                "What?"

                "Not feel bad about blowing it to hell."

                "Oh.  Good.  _Storm Ray!_"  Cata hadn't often tried this second-level Psynergy, and was aware that it could go wrong at times, but when the purple electricity stabbed at her 'stony'-faced opponent, then rippled all the way down like water off a giant, homicidal duck before exploding in a shower of sparks at the ground, she guessed something was up.

                "That's a sentinel!  Psynergy won't work properly on it!" shouted Cian, looking up from healing Padriac's injuries.

                "You might have said!" Cata yelled back, stumbling as she tried to hold her guard against another deadly swing.  "Now what?"

                "Psynergy-resistant," Meg growled.  Her twin swords were gifts from a Jupiter Clan village -the whole story was known only to herself and Squall- and could be charged with Psynergy at will, but that could mean almost anything against this thing.  "I've heard of 'favoured' prey, but never 'oh-Spirits-keep-it-away-from-me' prey."

                The sentinel drove Cata back towards the wall with a charging series of attacks, bashing down her defences until she was too tired even to raise her guard.  Cata dropped her sword, focusing instead on dodging the construct's attacks, but she knew it couldn't last long.

                So did Zak.  He hated the whole idea of adventuring, long journeys across terrain-with-attitude, and particularly ocean travel to find an underground dungeons filled with whole _new_ things that wanted them dead, but he came along anyway, because more than he hated all that, he cared about Cata.

                The sentinel dropped to one knee and swept Cata off her feet, then raised its sword for a deadly blow.  Zak raised too, and his flailing hoof struck first, smashing the sentinel's head off with a sound like a difficult cork finally rocketing out of the bottleneck.

                "Thanks," said Cata, breathing hard.

                "I'm wasting the rest of them before they wake up," Meg decided, and her swords began to flicker with Mars' power.

                "Got it all together, then?"

                "The Trident, however often it may have failed in legend, has not been broken for centuries."

                "This would be a bad time for history to repeat itself."

                "I believe most of those instances were fabricated anyway."

                "Just be prepared."

                An observant person wouldn't have had any trouble following the Adepts' path into the Lemurian Ruins.  They wouldn't really have to be all that observant.  A reasonably intelligent salamander would have managed it.  There was a trail of still-warm statues with charred, blade-shaped holes roughly through the heart, though occasionally one had been decapitated by a well-placed hoof strike as well.

                "I'm actually rather surprised that they don't dissipate Psynergy all the time.  The intelligent thing to do would have been to build it into their armor," said Cian, studying one of the statues.

                "Intelligent, yes, physically possible, no," Zephyr responded.  "The only way to do it would be with more Psynergy, wouldn't it?  Then someone casts Bind and the whole thing explodes in a fiery paradox."

                "I'm beginning to think I'm claustrophobic," Zak commented.

                "Where are they?" demanded Elys.  "We're just wandering down here and it's driving me crazy!"

                "Y'know," said Cata, thoughtfully, "it could be that these are just regular statues."

                "It's still satisfying," Meg said, ventilating another.

                "The walls are sort of closing in, the deeper we get…" said Zak in a quieter voice.

                "You are likely the _least focused troupe of adventurers I've _ever_ known," Padriac said._

                "He's got that right!  What about Jastyx?  I thought we were supposed to be hunting thieves!" said Elys, nearly shouting, but reluctant to speak too loudly.  The corridors echoed enough already.

                "Did you have a suggestion, then?  Running through the halls aimlessly and totally losing our sense of direction?" said Cian.

                "You're telling me you know where we are now?" Elys demanded.

                "To exit, we would head, of course, in the reverse direction we are now, taking the third, first, first, fourth, second, third- all of these directions would be numbered from the left, of course-"

                "You're making that up."

                "I forgot how perceptive you are.  My apologies," said the Lemurian, bowing.

                "We're already lost?" asked Cata.

                "It would appear so."

                "Then I'm with Elys," said Meg, tugging her sword free and slipping ahead past the others.  "Follow me and don't fall behind."

                Meg moved at first with a liquid pace that didn't seem to move any less randomly than their previous path, but after a few minutes she reached a crossroads where she studied the damp dust closely for what seemed like an eternity.  Squall hushed any beginnings of conversation until at last Meg straightened up.  "At last.  Two people, one person, probably male, in a cloak, and another of a build that matches what I saw of Jastyx as she ran by in the Cliffs…  Right.  I've got them."

                And then she ran like patient lightning, the others following as swiftly and quietly as they could.  Meg's footfalls were not silent, which surprised the others, but there was a rhythm to the tapping that insinuated into your heartbeat, wasn't background noise so much as it told you it was background noise.

                Then she turned a corner, ran through a shattered door and entered a vast chamber, perhaps an ancient amphitheatre.  The walls rose at a slope behind the door, with ledges carved into them that might have been simple benches, and ahead was a wide, smooth platform with great pools of perfectly clear water on either side, leading to a single towering statue of Poseidon, guardian spirit and disciple of Mercury.

                And standing at the oft-chaotic Poseidon's feet were two figures, one cloaked, and the other all too familiar.  Jastyx turned, hearing Zak's hooves failing to be quiet, while the cloaked one continued to look up at Poseidon.

                "You're good, I admit," said Jastyx, flipping her trailing hair off her shoulder.  "And you've picked up a new idiot or two.  Though the savage looks a bit familiar…"

                "You probably caught sight of me while you ran for your life from the Little Death I felled a minute later," Meg shot back, drawing her swords again with a sound that snake fangs hope to reach when they grow up.

                "I won't bother to correct you.  It would imply that I could potentially care about your boxed in little mind," the dark-eyed Venus Adept said.

                "I know the ways of nature, and you don't seem to fit."  The swords flared red.

                "Oh, but I know so much more," Jastyx replied, a look of wild excitement in her eyes.

                "Do you know what it feels like to carry an anchor after being clapped in irons?" asked Padriac.

                "Arr, she'll know what the _Raven_'s keel feels like afore the day's out!" Hail seconded.

                Jastyx seemed shocked at the Djinni's appearance.  At the sound of Hail's distinctively inhuman voice, the cloaked figure turned as well.

                "That was a Djinni," he stated from the hood's depths.  "Mercury, which is unfortunate, but I'd settle for any element.  Such concentrated power."

                "Get the book and we'll see about Djinn later.  I'll hold them off," said Jastyx.

                "Hold them off?" said the cloaked man.

                "Hold us off?" demanded Cata.

                "You think they'd survive your first attack?"

                "You think you can take us?"

                Cata and locked eyes with the hood.  There was a moment that seemed to contain a swift contest of willpower, and then they both looked back to the group at large as Elys pushed Padriac and Meg aside as politely as she could make herself be.

                "Halt your scheme, vile thieves, and return the Sea God's Tear, or we shall take it by force.  Do not doubt our strength, we fight for the lives of our family and friends, and can never be overtaken by such dark plans as you may hope to achieve," the Dailan girl announced, Mercury Psynergy swirling around her hands.

                Cata looked at her friend in awe.  "Elys, you're a natural."

                "I'm beginning to see the attraction," Elys admitted.

                "I'm not impressed yet," the cloaked man declared.  "I admit a flair with words, but you're not the only one.  Cower and beg for mercy, foolish weaklings, your attacks shall be defeated and returned with lethal force if we must.  You face an undefeatable warrior, a fury passed from age to age by name and mantle.  You face power that you can never imagine, and I am protected by another force far greater than your own."  He threw back his cloak, revealing dark armor of silver and blue, held together by dark violet leather.  He wore no helmet but a mane of red and iron-grey hair, and his face could have been any age, but was strong, as though carved perfectly from granite.  "I am Dullahan!"

                After a pause, Cata forced the thrill of old terrors down and spoke in a way that would have made ancient knights proud, particularly in abandoning the archaic style.  "Y'know, the last Dullahan ended up headless.  Want to keep with that tradition, too?"

                Elys struck first, raising her hands and lashing out with Ice Psynergy, a rain of tearing icicles that didn't stop.  Maintaining Psynergy wasn't an easy feat, but sheer anger can take the place of many things, and in this case the difficulties of becoming a channel for Psynergy decided that perfect mental discipline was overrated anyway.

                The shards clashed harmlessly off Dullahan's armor, and could not even touch his unprotected face.  He drew a sword that crackled with power, cleaved the air once before going into a ready stance, and Elys pivoted, striking Jastyx as she tried to slip in close while the others' attention was diverted.

                Then it fell into chaos.  Jastyx rolled away from the frigid assault and leapt to her feet again, but found that Meg and Cian were already prepared to meet her.  The Venus Adept raised a hand and the ornamental spears from two statues flew from their stony grasps, reshaping in the air much like her technique in the Kandorean Cliffs.  The metal warped together and then spun, stretching out into the double-bladed weapon sometimes called a maul sword.

                Jastyx lifted the sword-staff into a block just in time to catch the rapier and one of Meg's swords, but the second came in underneath, letting Meg keep the offensive.  Then, to Cata's eyes, the three of them became a rampaging globe of points and glinting steel.  Certain that any attempts to help there would leave in her worse condition than most of the local statuary, she beckoned to Elys and Padriac, and the three of them faced off against the man who called himself Dullahan.

                He wasn't as unnaturally fast as Jastyx, but even a deflected strike from him was as vicious as that of the Lemurian sentinels, and his armor was flawless, without opening or weakness, and Cata felt like she was trying to chop down a castle with antisocial tendencies.

                When the combatants calmed down enough to start using Psynergy, Zak was glad he had stayed at a distance.  Ice shards burst from both melees, Meg kept Jastyx off-balance by sweeping the ground with Flare, and Cata's intermittent Ray attacks showered them all with sparks.  Worse were Jastyx's attacks -glowing skulls of more than one kind and occasional blasts of flying stalactites- or Dullahan's simple Psynergy-strengthened attacks that threw even Padriac several feet through the air.

                "Find way to be helpful without getting turned into steaks, find way to be helpful without getting turned into steaks…" Zak muttered, looking around the wide room for anything a horse could use to aid his friends in deadly battle.  Something caught his eye.  "If that… and it could dislodge… time to see if those stories were anything more than artistic license, I guess."

                Padriac did, admittedly, carry a cutlass.  It was expected of a sea captain.  But he preferred the personal involvement of his well-forged and Psy-tempered gauntlets, and was careful in his movements while Cata and Elys kept Dullahan busy.  He just needed one chance.

                "We don't need to kill you, you know," Dullahan said, graciously.  "Leave now and we shall not follow.  We have more important things to do."

                "Not likely," said Padriac, behind him.  "I was _promised pirates and I intend to __get pirates."  Dullahan knocked Cata backed, slashed a Prism into halves, and turned to look at the captain.  Padriac raised one metal-clad fist and smashed it into Dullahan's face, then pulled back, cradling it.  "What the hell are you made of?"_

                "It is not skin that protects me, but the power of-"

                "Cata!  Elys!  Get away!" shouted Zak from afar.  Dullahan frowned, looking up to the source of the call, then slashed, cutting diagonally across Padriac's chest and seriously opening him up.  The captain clutched at the long wound as Cata grabbed him and pulled him away from Dullahan.  Elys threw another Prism and then moved to help her friend.

                Zak judged them to be far away enough and then looked at the old, worn wall.  The stone was cracked and damaged by floodwaters, enough that a good kick with a back hoof _here_ should cause… should…  wow, that was more effective than expected.

                The stone crumbled under his strike, for Zak was an Adept too, and had talent similar to Dullahan's in giving power to his attacks.   Several levels of the benches above broke as well, taking the support from a spear-wielding statue that fell over, smashing through a supporting pillar.  Fractures ran along the ceiling, all the way to Poseidon, and then a small avalanche of wreckage fell from the arches, crashing into Poseidon's crossed arms.

                The arms shattered too, raining broken stone onto Dullahan, but he shrugged it off as easily at Cata's sword strikes, instead simply staring at what was revealed.  A bright light shone from the damaged statue's chest, precisely the point where the arms had crossed over.

                "Jastyx!  He found it!" shouted the armored warrior.  A great Earthquake knocked Meg and Cian aside for a few brief moments, long enough for Jastyx to see the swirling light and draw out the Sea God's Tear, which she threw into the air.  It pulsed a deep blue once and the light from Poseidon faded.  No one but Elys noticed the Tear's fall, and she leapt to catch it.  The Tear landed in her palm with a satisfying _thud_, and she quickly pocketed the stone.

                With the blinding light gone, a perfect cube of crystal could be seen embedded deep inside the statue, and something else was hidden within that, a small black object.  Dullahan pulled a very short staff from his armor, and in his hand it expanded into the Trident of Ankohl, gleaming even in the dim light.  This too was thrown, a swift arc that led it straight into the crystal.  Lightning leapt from the Trident to the cube as its prongs bit in, and then the whole thing exploded.

                The three parts of the Trident landed at Elys' feet, and she absentmindedly gathered them up as well.  The black artefact within was also thrown free, and while Elys might have managed to catch it under different circumstances, she was smashed aside by Jastyx, who clutched at what she now saw was a book as though the very world depended on its safety.

                "The Book of Summoning," said Cian, fitting together a few old Lemurian stories about hidden treasures and 'the heart of Poseidon'.  "You've found where we hid the Tomegathericon."

                "If you wanted to keep it out of others' hands, you should have burned it."  Jastyx grinned.  "You couldn't, could you?  It's too powerful even for an altruistic to willingly destroy.  You didn't _need to, did you?  Surely it was safe simply to hide it?  Fools."  Then a flicker of motion caught her eye and she turned, fighting with all her skill to hold off Meg's relentless attack._

                Cian rushed over to the fallen captain.  Padriac was looking pale and a single glance would not only show why, but give a doctor some first-hand information on internal anatomy.

                "No… Elys, can you heal this?" asked Cian.

                "Maybe with a few years' intensive training for Pure Ply," she replied.  "A simple Ply wouldn't do anything more than delay… um…"

                "I get it," said Cian, not wanting her to finish the sentence either.

                "Well, get on with it," said a Mercury Djinni that walked up beside him.

                "Hail, I don't have time for you… hey, where'd your pirate act go?" asked Cian, too curious to keep the words from coming out.  The Mercury Djinni looked up at him, eyes widening.

                "Pirate?  Hail?  _Hail?!  Where is that psychopath?" demanded the Djinni, looking around._

                "Who are you?" Cian demanded right back, grabbing the Djinni.

                "Spring, ancestral Djinni of Lemuria.  I'm quite the healer.  Want some help?"

                Meg struck as swiftly and as hard as she could, but Jastyx was always able to just keep up with her.  In theory, having two separate blades should have given her the advantage over Jastyx's maul sword, but that didn't seem to be the case.  If there was just…

                The obvious solution hit her just quickly enough to let her jump back to reality and block the first attack Jastyx had made in some time.  Meg focused, not having quite the skill of the other Adepts, but still a hunter and follower of Mars, by the Spirits.  "_Fire!"  A volley of minor fireballs flew from her hand and wrapped around Jastyx's sword.  Being able to craft weapons from raw metal was an interesting skill, but when the entire thing went red-hot, the Venus Adept wondered if maybe she should invest in something with an insulated hilt.  She turned to run._

                "Jastyx!" shouted Dullahan.  So far only Cata, not involved in any of the struggles, had noticed the warrior's predicament.  The wreckage from the ceiling and statue might not have hurt him, but it had gathered in quite a heap, and at the moment Dullahan was a rock pile with  arms and a head.  At the call of her name, Jastyx didn't stop, but hurled a charge of Venus Psynergy behind her, blasting the rocks to dust.

                Dullahan pulled free of the last stones and sprinted to catch up, but Padriac was quick, and grabbed a plated ankle as it became available, tripping him.  Silently thanking Spring's amazing healing powers, the captain placed a boot on Dullahan's back.

                "_I believe that you shall _always_ remember this as the day that you _almost_ defeated Captain Padriacazulen Briggs," he said, grinning.  Dullahan smashed a fist against the ground, shaking them all off balance with another Quake, and then sank into the earth, out of sight._

                "They both got away?" asked Cata.

                "I guess," Elys answered.  "But we've got the Tear, and this Trident they must have stolen too."

                "It's from Ankohl.  They'll want it back.  Maybe we can get it reforged first," suggested Cian, wondering what the Elders' reaction might be to find that their most prized artifact had been broken _again._

                "Got another Djinni, too," Meg noted, seeing Spring on Cian's shoulder.  "That's two Jupiter and two Mercury now."

                "Don't start," Squall warned her.  "The fewer Mars Djinn the better."

                "I swear I didn't know that book thing was in there," said Zak.

                "The Tomegathericon," Cian muttered.

                "Not good," Zephyr decided.

                "We had better-" began Padriac.

                "Run," Cata finished.  The others looked at her.  She pointed to the space where the crystal holding the book had been.  Water was flowing out of it, causing the pools to overflow, and there was a strange rushing sound that made itself understood when a great torrent began to rush out of the hole.

                "RUN!" they all agreed.

**[Author's Notes]** First off, yeah, the 'maul sword' thing was a reference to Darth Maul.  Second, well… there isn't a definite second, and I don't have the concentrational capacity to think of one, or do much of anything other than make up long words that _almost_ mean something.  If computer problems are going to cause me this much trouble, they should at least be in my computer (don't ask).  Next chapter… I have no idea when it'll be up.  Sometime within the next couple of weeks, I guess, as usual.  Ja mata ne.


	6. Old Heroes In New Armor

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Six: Old Heroes In New Armor**

                "The Tomegathericon has been found and taken," Helena repeated weakly, falling into a chair.  The other Adepts had run back to the watchguard headquarters after escaping the flooded ruins, and quickly explained the situation (though Meg very carefully didn't mention anything about statues, in case they _were_ just statues).  "This is terrible."

                "I don't get it.  I've heard of the Tomegathericon, I guess," said Cata.  "Didn't the Kibombo write it?  How bad can it be?"

                "They may have," Cian affirmed, "but if one of them did write it, that one has long fallen to madness and shadow.  There are a few chapters in it with nothing more than simple power-raising rituals and the like.  But there are also forbidden chapters that no witch doctor may gaze upon, by order of their guardian spirit, Gabomba."

                "How can you tell if someone reads them?" asked Elys, and if she had known the answer, she would have wished she never asked.

                "The _last one who did was found in Naribwe," said Padriac.  "Well, a lot of him.  The _rest_, or at least the ashes they _decided_ were _probably_ the rest, were found on the roof."_

                "Ugh."

                "Of his summer cottage in Ankohl province."

                "Stop right there.  Or a few minutes ago, if possible."

                "Seems to me that Jastyx and Dullahan are likely to blow themselves up anyway, then," said Zak, lowering himself to lie down and take the weight off his hooves.  "I really don't think it's worth the effort to go looking to save those two."

                "I'd probably agree with you, if it were just them I was worried about," said Cian.

                "What do you mean?" asked Elys.

                "Right before Zak did his one-kick-obliterates-all renovation, Dullahan was boasting about having some extra power backing him up," Cata recalled.

                "Precisely," said Cian.

                "So, if it's some artifact or whatever, then maybe they can protect themselves from the book," Meg added as she thought it through.

                "And if it's actually another Adept giving them strength, then that one might be able to handle the Tomegathericon too," said Helena.  "Either way, anyone who could steal the Trident of Ankohl, the Sea God's Tear, and sneak onto Lemuria _and into the ruins before being caught can't be daft enough to try reading the Book of Summoning like they got it from the library."_

                "The what?" asked Cata, Elys, Zak, and Meg in unison.  Helena looked at them, confused.

                "Farm girl, farm girl, farm horse, huntress," Cian listed, pointing out each of them and ignoring Zak's 'Oh, thank you, farm _horse_, didn't hear farm human female in there' and related grumblings.

                "Ah," said Helena, but decided that explaining libraries wasn't needed right now.  "Anyway… you've got the Tear back, what do you plan to do?"

                "Get back to Daila before the storms destroy our home, which is what'll happen if we wait any longer - which could have happened already _Cata we have to get home now!_" shouted Elys, grabbing her best friend's arms and dragging her in the direction of the door.

                "Daila stands, Elys," said Helena.  "I managed to slip an inquiry in to one of the merchant vessels while you were in the ruins -which I technically shouldn't have done, considering the power of the Council Glyph, I mean, it _is_ an ancient treasure of the country-"  She was getting too angst-ridden for Meg to handle.

                "Calm down," she ordered them.  "Elys, don't freak out.  Daila's still just fine.  Helena, same thing.  To quote Prachetes, 'rules are there to make you think before you break them'."  She noticed the look Cian was giving her.  "Well, I knew those philosophers couldn't all be idiots."

                "That doesn't change much," said Elys.  "We still have to get the Tear back, and fast."

                "And _what about those thieves?" asked Padriac, who had finally admitted that they weren't especially pirate-like, however disappointing it might be._

                "They could be going anywhere," Zak pointed out, but not with much hope.

                "Excuse me," said Spring, springing into existence and onto Cian's head.

                _Y'know, said Cata to Zephyr, in her head, _I bet your wings would be really good at keeping an Adept's ears warm_._

                "Is that…" began Helena, but Elys was getting tired of the constant Djinni-worship (possibly because she didn't have one) and shushed her.

                "I've spent a long time in the ruins," Spring went on.  "I've been keeping watch on the Tomegathericon.  I know its power too well for my liking, but there's a Psynergy to that book unlike anything else.  I'd recognise it anywhere."

                "And?" Cian encouraged his Djinni.

                "And right now it's moving at high speed away from us, somewhere south of here.  I'll lead the way, if you want, but don't expect a lot of precision."

                "You want to keep following them?!" asked Elys, clearly wondering about Cata's sanity, as evidenced by the thoughtful look on her face, which Elys could read like a book.

                "_You two should go back to Daila with the Tear, as Cian promised, _Spring_ will lead us to Jastyx and Dullahan like _he_ promised, and I'll get to throw those thieves in the brig like _you_ promised," said Padriac, but Cata was protesting before he finished speaking._

                "You think that we can't help just because we're girls?" she demanded.

                "No.  _Firstly_, the horse goes with you," said the captain.

                "Oh thank Venus," Zak mumbled.

                "_Second, the incarnation of vengeance comes with __us, because she'll be helpful and scary and has a crush on Cian," Padriac finished._

                "As soon as someone tells me what that means there is going to be a reckoning, you part-Lemurian misfit," said Meg.  She looked around.  No one was forthcoming.  "Cian?"

                "Mm?"  He looked up from what was apparently a really, really interesting book on Helena's desk.  "Oh, probably some kind of sailor-speak, I wouldn't know."  Meg raised an eyebrow and then looked at Helena, who was also suddenly engrossed in paperwork.

                "It's like I'm being shunned," she muttered.  "Are all Lemurians bad liars?"

                "Most of them," Helena replied.

                "I am not giving up on this quest," Cata insisted, glad to escape the current topic.

                "You-" Cian began.

                "_I," Cata declared, and this time rolling thunder backed her up, "__am not giving up on this quest."_

                "I must admit, you showed her," said Meg to Padriac, standing near him on the side of the Lemurian ship.  "To think that a girl would try to continue her personal quest when she had big, strong, not-all-that-assertive men to do it for her while she grew vegetables."

                "Shut up," the captain groaned.

                Hail didn't like the situation either.  To the south of Lemuria was the city of Alhafra, the core of the great Osenia Trade Company, and Padriac had explained that, for various reasons that he didn't have time to explain, neither he nor the Tide Raven would be welcomed there.  So, after a bit of arguing, he had relented to riding one of the Lemurian trader ships back to the mainland, and the Tide Raven would be given a temporary permanent (there was an argument over whether or not that was possible, too) dock at Lemuria.

                Now the fastest schooner available was carrying Pietr to Daila with the Sea God's Tear, and would then go north to return the Trident's fragments to the people of Ankohl.  And that left Cata, Elys, and Zak at the boarding platform to the trader vessel with the others, asking Helena what the box was for.

                "It's a sort of… adventuring pack," said Helena.  "As attached as I'm sure you are to your sword-"

                "Not really," said Cata, grinning.

                "-There's equipment in here that I think you'll all find useful," the woman finished.

                "Just don't expect me to be trading these in for some Lemurian flouncing rapier," Meg called from the ship, but Cata opened it and found herself nearly blinded by the sunlight reflecting off a Lemurian-forged longsword, and the deep silver of it declared it to be mythril.

                "You can't possibly-" Cata began.

                "I'll not have a girl an eighth my age tell me what I can and cannot give to aid heroes," said Helena, firmly.  "Lemuria is a grand city, and these are by far not the greatest of its treasures."

                "Heroes," Cata repeated, possibly blushing, except that she was still staring at the sword, and so her hair fell around her face.

                "What else do I call a few brave Adepts who seek out dangerous thieves and risk their lives to save their home?" asked Helena, rhetorically.

                "Idiots, if they don't go back to that home afterwards," Zak grumbled.

                "In older days, people like yourselves were called knights," Helena went on.  "And I think that's exactly what you are.  Knights, guardians from all the elements.  Knights of Alchemy."

                "Looks like you went about things the right way, then," said Elys with a grin, and Cata turned flame-red.

                "Mars is still underrepresented," Meg pointed out, still out of sight above them.

                "File a grievance," Helena suggested, grinning.

                "Do what?" asked Elys.

                "Never mind."  A melodious horn rang out from the top of the ship, the call for all crew and passengers to board.  Sailors scrambled about the deck and in the hold, making the final preparations for launch, while Cata and Elys hauled the chest of equipment up to the deck.

                "I don't suppose you need a horse for the watchguards?" asked Zak, hopefully.

                Helena laughed.  "Get up there.  They're the ones who need you."

                "No one bothers with what _I might want…" Zak grumbled, but he wouldn't have really stayed, even if Helena agreed.  The ruins had convinced him of that.  The satisfying _thock_ of the sentinel's head flying off still echoed in his head, along with one truth: he couldn't leave, knowing that one day Cata could face a situation when her life would depend on him again._

                "Hang on," said the captain of the ship to Meg, Cian, and Padriac.

                "Hang on?" Padriac repeated, and pointedly did nothing of the sort, even though the others did.  "I'm captain of the _Tide Raven, you know.  The fastest ship on the-"_

                The Lemurian craft rose out of the water as the helmsman focused his Psynergy, and water rolled off two great white wings, matching the dragon-figurehead very well.  Two assistant helmsmen called up Psynergy as well, and the wings began to sparkle with scintillating light.  The ship rocketed ahead, barely skimming the waves.  Cian and Meg reached out, each catching hold of one of Padriac's arms as he crashed backwards.

                "Second fastest," the captain corrected him, and she wandered off to get on with the business of captaining.

                "Contigan dragon wings," Padriac marvelled.  "I didn't know they were still crafted."

                "They aren't.  But they're very durable, and only a fool would decommission a winged ship," Cian pointed out, and it didn't take long to see how right he was.  The Lemurian ship moved like an ocean falcon; it took a fair bit of concentration and careful balancing to move around on the deck, and so instead the Adepts -the Knights of Alchemy- spent the voyage in the hold, going over the gear Helena had sent them off with.

                And when the ship reached Alhafra, a rather different group stepped down onto the docks, looking around for any hints of Jastyx and Dullahan's recent passage.  Cata now wore a suit of light plate mail with a touch of gold in its colour over a warm purple travel robe, and the mythril longsword hung at her side.  Her step was more confident than ever before- just wearing the armor made her feel properly knightly, and adding that to her natural attitude, it was going to be a bad day for anyone who tried to cause trouble.

                Elys was less extravagantly different, but the circlet on her head caught the sunlight nicely, and the phoenix designs on her armlets seemed to dance as she walked.  Cian wore a Lemurian mantle, though he still passed on the traditional headdress, and kept his sabre.

                Meg looked exactly the same, though anyone trying any tricks on her -and she fully expected this to happen inside such a big city- was likely to find out that she had hidden various other kinds of equipment in hidden pockets and such places, most of which were good at causing pain from a distance.

                Onboard the ship, Padriac had looked disproportioned, as he had found Riot Gloves and Hyper Boots in the miniarmory (like a minibar, but causing damage to foes rather than credit cards) that counted on size for defensiveness.  Stepping into Alhafra, though, he looked like Death.  Fortunately, this was due to a large, shadowy cloak rather than a starvation diet or anything similar.

                "Padriac?  Is that you?" asked Elys, thinking they were being followed until she recognized the clomping of the boots.

                "Yes.  Just keep going," he said, quickly.

                "At last someone else doesn't like cities," said Meg, glaring at the buildings.

                While Elys didn't mind cities, she found Alhafra easy to hate.  It was a highly "civilized" city, which apparently meant "bleedin' full of great big stone buildings, an inordinate number of which give off smoke, and all of which are a disgusting brown-green-grey colour".  At least, that was what it looked like around the docks, and in case it looked nicer elsewhere, it made up for it by being really unpleasant here.  The streets were a quarter-inch deep in a substance that was mostly soot.

                "According to Lemurian legend, the ruler of Alhafra, the 'mayor', hasn't been a decent person for seven hundred years.  There was a man who cut down a forest near here, ignoring the tales of trees spirits and the like, but they were real, and the last one cursed the town.  They say that every mayor will be consumed by greed and the city shall suffer, until one day when the people decide to place humans over wealth," said Cian as they walked through the streets.

                "Humans," Zak repeated.  "Thank you.  You could at least have said 'people', at least then there'd have been some ambiguity." He sighed.  "No one cares about horses."

                "Helena didn't forget you," Cata pointed out.  "I thought you liked those mythril horseshoes."

                "Oh, absolutely," said Zak.  He clattered one down the side of a building, creating a shower of sparks.  "Is that not the coolest thing ever?"  He clopped the thing twice more, and then a section of wall shattered.  Despite the close quarters of the roads between huge buildings, no one seemed to have noticed.  He moved on, whistling until he remembered that whistling horses aren't often considered inconspicuous.

                "I wonder how long it'll take," murmured Elys, still thinking about the legend.

                "_Can't imagine, _let's_ not stick around to ask public opinion, shall we?" said Padriac, pleasantly if manically.  He would have far outrun them by now, except that he was taking care to stand in the rough middle, where no one would notice him._

                Oddly enough, this was exactly the technique being used by another person in the crowd.  He stepped into the marketplace plaza at the same time as the Knights, entering from the opposite direction, and was wearing a long, thick cloak, with the hood pulled well over his face.  He and Padriac had very different reasons to be afraid, but they were both afraid of the same thing.

                It's a strange thing to be afraid of a bunch of twisted fibres.

                He slipped from place to place, not choosing shadows, because cloaked people standing in shadows -despite the apparent logic- are noticed almost instinctively, perhaps because those who don't notice them usually don't last long enough to try again.  Instead he chose to be out of the way, and after so many years, he was a master of standing in the background.

                The cloaked figure who wasn't Padriac didn't often go out in crowds unless there was no other choice, and such was the case now.  He preferred to buy food at the end of the day, when the people were fewer and scattered, but it was likely that if he waited any longer, he'd have passed out from hunger by then.  It was another one of those occupational hazards.

                Cloaks still draw a fair amount of attention, even when not in shadows, and he could practically sense the odd looks coming from all directions.  Still, between the hood and the gloves, he was probably safe.  Well, as close to safe as was ever likely.  Unless someone managed to accidentally do something really st-

                The following events are probably proof that the Elemental Spirits had taken an interest in Cata's group, because the timing is nearly epic.

                The world's most inventive cook, Mrs Cruikshank, had gone out to buy eggs for a cake.  It was for her granddaughter's birthday, and in fact, she was a few hours away from being the inventor of the birthday cake.  (In earlier years, she had also invented cinnamon buns, perogies, jambalaya, curried oatmeal -they weren't all good, mind you- and, when she was four, sliced bread.)

                She would make the cake, but it would be a bit late, and she would do it with shaking hands, trying to replace a flicker of hidden eyes in her mind with the correct amount of flour.  She happened to look up from the heggler's cart directly into the depths of the hood, and with a strangled yelp, darted off into the crowd as quickly as possible.

                The crook of her walking stick, though, caught a fold of the cloak, and wrenched it back.  The crowd in the market was dense, and Howl was within a few feet of at least ten people, all of whom suddenly got a closer look at a lycanthrope than they had ever wanted.

                "_Werewolf!" someone screamed, drawing the attention of a few hundred more people Howl wanted desperately to avoid, especially if they were armed._

                His nearly-wolfish face took on a look of concentration for a moment, and then he moved.  The strength and speed of a wolf, combined with the balance and planning of a human, was absolutely unbeatable if you wanted to escape someone.  When you were escaping some dozens, it was less useful.

                Howl slipped between the citizens like a knife through water, with all the grace and talent of a lycanthrope whose ancestors were never turned into rugs.  And fear wasn't entirely against him, since the people got out of the way in a hurry for a speeding werewolf.  But every once in a while, there's someone courageous, and then things go out of whack.  Howl cannoned into the Knights after about four steps.

                Cata reached out and grabbed him by the collar.  "Where are you going?" she demanded.

                "Far, far away from here, I assure you!" he replied, slightly frantic, and in turn grabbed her wrist.  The hold of his furry, clawed hand was wickedly strong, and Cata let go in sheer astonishment.  Howl took the advantage, lifting her off her feet with a shove that toppled the rest of the Knights as well.  "Sorry!" he called over his shoulder, dashing away again.

                Padriac and Meg were up first, being the most capable of the group at dealing with difficult terrain, including the kind that came rushing up at you, as well as non-quadrupeds.  By the time they had veered around the corner after Howl, Zak was still working on his third leg.

                Howl juked through the streets, remembering to pull his hood back up after the first block.  By then the shouts were echoing off buildings, and they had probably heard about him in Lemuria: _werewolf in the street!_

                The Alhafran guards were on the move soon enough, and while they had the kind of mayor leading them who would have attained high rank in the Underworld, they were good at their job, and enjoyed protecting people.  They could have used a broader definition of 'people', in Howl's opinion.

                After a several minutes of pursuit through the thickly-populated streets, Meg and Padriac had caught up enough to try a tactic or two.  The huntress sped forward as quickly as she could, and the mere sight of a rather wild woman getting within reach on his left drove Howl straight to the right- into Padriac's waiting grasp.

                "_What do you think you're _doing_ in a city like _this_ if you look like __that?" demanded Padriac._

                Howl glanced back, saw Meg standing alert in the road and heard the watch steadily eating up his lead.  "Look, I apologise deeply for this," said Howl, looking anguished, and decked Padriac across the right temple.  He dropped like a stone, and Howl ducked into the alley ahead.

                "Everything I hate about hunting animals mixed with everything I hate about people," Meg muttered, and ran down the street, wishing with all her might that this was a forest.  Unfortunately, this meant she wasn't there when the watch caught up, and when they saw a cloaked figure lying at the entrance to an alley that ended in a wall (one with a great many handholds, if you've got claws), they were sure they had him.

                "Hey, this guy's not furry," said one, picking up Padriac's limp form by the shoulders.

                "They're werewolves, corporal.  Furry is just an option," said the sergeant.

                "Then he was pretty stupid to go wolf on us in the middle of the marketplace," the corporal said.

                "Sir!" another guard called, rushing up behind them, a little out of breath.  "I've got… seven witnesses… saying he attacked some people who tried to stop him back in the market."

                "Really?  Well, I don't know if being a bloody monster is an offence in this city, but attacking civilians is always a simple one.  Haul him in.  Y'know, corporal, this guy looks kinda familiar," the sergeant added quietly.  "In fact…"

                "What is it, sir?" asked the corporal, confused by the thoughtful look on his superior's face.  At that moment, the sergeant was remembering the last time he had seen raven-black hair on a man, and remembering the sound of a crossbow and a sudden flare of pain… and _pirates._

                "Corporal, run back to the guardhouse.  I do believe we're going to have a hanging."

                Howl came out of another alleyway, hood pulled up as far as possible, and checked for pursuit.  No one anywhere.  Not even anyone shouting in the distance.  He leaned back against a brick wall and tried to catch his breath.

                A blade made its presence known just under his chin.  "Give me a really good reason not to kill you," said Meg.

                Howl looked back at her, his disbelieving expression hidden by the darkness of his cloak.  "It would be unjust to kill me without telling me how the hell you did that."  Meg was blank for a moment, then grinned.

**[Author's Notes]**  A minor cliffhanger's all.  There's a review button down there that you should press if you want to complain or anything.  Or if you don't.  It's an important button.  Go hit it and maybe the next chapter'll be up soon.


	7. The Heart of a Man

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Seven: Heart of A Man**

                "What _were you doing in Alhafra, anyway?" asked Elys._

                "Trying to stay low for a little while.  They're… watching for me in Micastle," Howl answered, and then began savaging a roast chicken leg.  He and most of the Knights were in a dark tavern in a part of Alhafra that hadn't yet heard about the monster killing twenty people in the marketplace that morning (the rumour was moving slowly, for a rumour in a dense city, but it was making up for it with creativity).

                "What happened there?" asked Cian, who was more than a little wary of werewolves.

                "Nothing," said Howl, a little too fast.

                "What did you eat that you weren't supposed to, then?" asked Meg.

                Howl glared at her, and part-wolves are good at glaring, but Meg was better.  Nothing could match eyes the colour of earth and blood.  "Maybe two chickens, but I was going to pay for them soon," he replied, meekly.  Meg didn't even twitch.  The next words rushed out guiltily.  "And half a sheep and a turkey two weeks earlier."  He took a deep breath, or at least bit deeply into the leg again, which was much the same thing for a wolf.  "Look, it's not easy for someone who looks like me to get by in life, okay?  At least normal werewolves just have to say they've got a cold once a month and no one spreads any rumours except to say that you don't get enough fresh air."

                "So what makes you so different?" asked Elys, fascinated.

                "Most lycanthropes -werewolf is a bit too feral for my liking, thank you, I'm not a monster- are Jupiter Adepts, or have a little Jupiter blood in them.  For some reason, I'm pure Venus Adept, and that plays merry hell with lycanthropy.  Not all human, not all wolf, but all the time."

                "And I thought the 'bad hair day all over' was rough," Elys remarked, halfheartedly picking up a wing.  "What is this, anyway?"

                "Cifulizhed food," said Cian, his voice slightly muffled by his sandwich, which was apparently gravy-and-mayonnaise.  "A form of cuishine on itsh own leful."

                "Along with industrial waste and the plague pits," Meg muttered, and wondered if trying to burn the offending dishes would just make them more aggressive.

                "I wonder if Cata's found out where Padriac's got to yet," Elys mused.

                At this moment, in fact, Cata was returning to the tavern with some disturbing news.  She leapt off Zak's back at the door and told him to wait for her in the stables, which he reacted to with predictable good-naturedness.

                "Stables!  Like I'm some kind of animal!" he growled even as he wandered in.  He then considered the facts.  "Like I'm some kind of _lesser_ animal!"  Zak lashed out to strew a pile of straw across the floor, and found that its core didn't approve.

                "Ouch!"

                "Who said that?" asked Zak, looking around.

                "No one."

                "Who didn't say it?"

                "Definitely not me."

                "…Who's in the straw?"

                "Well, no one anymore.  Thanks a lot for the kick-start, I might add.  Kick-start- hah!  Like I've ever needed one of those…"

                "I am _not hearing voices," Zak stated to the vacant stable._

                "Whatever makes you happy," replied the emptiness.

                "They what?!" Elys demanded, leaping up.

                "You seriously expect me to believe you didn't hear me the first time?" asked Cata.

                "Blasted city watch.  More trouble than they're worth, if you're a hero," Cian muttered.

                "I suppose you'd know," Meg remarked, with a sort of light sarcasm.

                "They can't possibly think that Padriac's really a were-"

                "Ahem."

                "-Lycanthrope!" Elys corrected herself.  "He's a sailor!  Not some kind of vicious beast!"

                "A-_hem."_

                "Oh, shut up!  This is your fault anyway!" Elys snapped.

                "I did wonder when you would stop being nice for no reason," Howl admitted.

                "We were nice because that's the kind of people we are, and I happen to have a soft spot for outcasts," Cata told him, a little coldly.

                "Yeah, you sure know what being an outcast is like," Elys muttered.  "How many people asked you to last year's harvest festival?  To the nearest dozen will do."

                "_However," Cata went on, to make it clear that she had not heard Elys in the slightest, "our friend is now in trouble, and it's your fault."_

                "My fault?!  He was the one chasing me!" Howl retorted.  "It's not like I asked him to be my spotter while I fled the Alhafran watch or something!"

                "Keep your voice down!" Cian hissed.

                "Oh, don't worry," said the waitress, clearing away a few plates.  "We get all sorts in this place.  'Ere, are you a werewolf?"

                "Um… yes," Howl answered slowly.

                "Fancy that," she said, and moved away.

                "We'd better go straighten things out, then," said Elys, breaking the moment of disbelief.

                "We'll need you to come along with us," said Cian to Howl.

                "And doing it in one piece is only easy for you, remember," Meg added, fractionally drawing her swords.

                "Um… actually, it's much, much worse than that," said Cata, a bit reluctant.  Faced with four questioning looks and no one asking any delaying questions, she forced herself to go on.  "There was only a mix-up to begin with.  Now… well…"

                Padriac regained consciousness, and predictably wished that he hadn't.  After a futile moment wondering if he could knock himself out again, he tried to see what kind of room he was in.  This also hurt.  His hands were tied, and he was sitting in a chair, that much he could tell without getting his eyes to focus on anything.  After a few minutes, the stars went away, and he wished they'd come back, considering the face that he was presented with.

                It was old, but not old enough to look wise, just enough to look unhealthy.  It was also bearded, mustached, with ironically thinning hair on top and a huge nose right in the middle.  And, according to a tiny voice that had saved Padriac more than once in his eventful life, a little familiar.

                "Hah!  Wasn't sure 'till I saw the eyes, but I was right!  This's him!  Ol' Paddy!"

                "Wha' th' heck's _Paddy_ s'p's'd m'n?" mumbled Padriac through a mouth that felt like a sock.

                "This is Don Quao's son?  The last in the line of Briggs?" asked another voice, out of sight.

                "M'not th' last Briggs," Padriac protested.  "'ve got a sister.  Back home."

                "Well, maybe so, but I don't remember any Briggs lasses causing us trouble," said the apparition of a face.  "You, though, I remember you _well, lad.  Especially the crossbow quarrel."_

                "M'not quarrelling," Padriac insisted, a slight pout coming into his dazed expression.  He reached with both hands (not having an option, due to the rope) for a hidden pocket in his tunic, which always contained a small bottle that might not clear things up, but would at least make the blur more interesting.  It was empty.  "Why's the rum gone?"

                "Not up on currently events," the lieutenant, the second voice, declared.  "You, Padriacazulen Briggs, ol' Paddy, have been caught by the Alhafran guard.  This means things are going to go badly for you.  We remember when your father used to prey on our merchants, and you were always quite happy to help him, weren't you?  And we put a stop to him, and all those other pirates in your… what was it?  Band of thieves?"

                "They called themselves the Coalition, I believe," said the first man, who had mercifully backed away.  "'Band of thieves' was too good for them anyway."

                "Coaliation, then.  And even though you escaped-"

                "By putting a bloody crossbow quarrel in my leg," growled the first man.

                "-We remembered you, didn't we?  And now you've been foolish enough to come back, and you're going to get the hanging you deserve."  The lieutenant kneeled in front of Padriac's chair, and looked him straight in the eyes, admirably not flinching too badly when faced with a gaze like an eagle.  "Because little boys have to learn that stealing is wrong."

                Padriac stared at him, stone-faced (a skill common to most Venus Adepts) for a long time.  Then an eyebrow rose.  "But why is the rum gone?" he asked at last.

                "Dawn?" suggested the lieutenant, looking to the first man, the sergeant.

                He looked out the window at the sun, past its peak and halfway to the horizon again.  "Sunset," he growled.  "Hang him at sunset."

                "They're going to _hang him?" Elys screeched._

                "He's Don Quao's son?" asked Cian, amazed.

                "Who's Don Quao?" asked Meg.

                "Greatest pirate to ever live," Cian replied quickly.  "He preyed on Alhafra back in the days when their fleet was one of the most ruthless trading fleets never to break the law.  They persuaded, enticed, bargained…"

                "'Threatened vaguely, threatened directly, and bribed' is more like it," muttered Howl, savaging another chicken leg.

                "But he was eventually caught, along with all the other pirates he had turned into the Alhafra Freelance Tax Collection Coalition-"

                "Meaning people who take whatever they can whenever they can, and be on the side of good," Howl added again.

                "And they were all killed except his son, who dove overboard just after the ship caught fire.  No one knew where he ended up, but apparently he was Padriac, and obviously he survived," Cian finished.

                Elys stared at Cian, stunned.  "Yes!" she said eventually.  "Survived!  As in 'is alive'!  But not for very long!  Was I the only one who heard the word 'execution'?!"

                "No.  So let's get moving," said Cata.  She pointed at Howl.  "What are we doing with the furball?"  He protested this, but no one really cared.

                "Maybe could trade him for Padriac," Meg snarled.

                "Hey, I don't deserve this either!" said Howl.  "Look, thanks for your help, but I need to get out of Alhafra while I still can.  If I get caught, that's not going to help your buddy either."

                "You're going to run?" Cata demanded, eyes flashing.

                "That'd be the general idea, yes," said Howl.  "Thank you again, and I hope you work something out with the Alhafrans, but I've got to run, and fast."  With that, Howl got up, pulled his hood further forward and cloak tighter, and darted out the door too fast for even Meg to catch him.

                "That's it?" said Elys, incredulous.

                "I guess so," Cata sighed.  "Let's go find Padriac and get him freed."

                "I refuse to believe I just imagined any of that, so you might as well come out," said Zak, turning around slowly and watching for any movement inside the stables.  "You're only wasting time.  Come on.  I'm a talking horse, what's scary about a talking horse?"

                "Um… lots?" suggested the voice.  At least, it seemed to be the same voice.  Something was subtly different about it.

                Zak gave this due consideration, pausing for a moment as Howl ran past the stables.  "Okay, maybe.  But I'm talking to a voice from nowhere."

                "At least you don't know what it is you've got to worry about."

                "_Is there anything I should worry about?" asked Zak, quickly._

                "Um… no?"

                The Knights ran past now, looking determined in the sort of way that says the four-legged part of the team has been forgotten right now, as happens very, very often.  Zak sighed and resumed arguing with no one.

                "Oh, come on, great big city like this, they probably have hangings every Tuesday at lunch, you can't tell me the place is this hard to find!" Meg growled to herself, doing her swift, leopard-like run down the streets, with the other Knights somewhere behind, trying to catch up.  She stopped to let them, then asked, "Okay, what's a good place for a gallows?"

                "The depths of the ocean," replied Elys, which told you everything you needed to know about her views on capital punishment (and probably lowercase too).

                "A good dramatic spot.  Out of the wind, unless you can get a good mournful groaning out of it.  A major plaza, so crowds can gather for the spectacle and get a bit of entertainment out of the whole thing," said Cian.  The others looked at him.  He said nothing.

                "Is Cian's knowledge of the nastier parts of the world starting to worry you too?" asked Cata.

                "Oh yeah," Elys agreed.

                "Look, I just picked a few things up while I travelled, okay?" he said defensively.

                "Sure thing, Piers," said Cata, heading on.  Elys and Meg followed.

                "I know your father liked to call me that sometimes, because I had been to so many ports, but… hey, wait up!"  The sun was getting low in the sky, and a faint redness was infusing its light.  They didn't have much time.  Padriac had less.

                "Tell you what," said Zak, diplomatically.  "I'll give you two choices."

                "…We- _I'm listening," said the voice eventually._

                "Either you, and I mean you _two_, I know there are two of you, come out and tell me what is going on, or I stomp the entire contents of this stable until they're used by Naribwe philosophers as examples of objects that exist only in two dimensions."

                "That's a fairly persuasive offer, but-"

                "I'm a Venus Adept, you know.  Just found out recently, but I can kick like an avalanche-"

                "All right already!" said the voice.  "Venus Adept.  You would have to be, too.  Still, there are worse things.  Okay, we're coming out."

                They found the plaza, eventually.  As Cian had suggested, the gallows was placed in a specific meeting of alleyways, so that the slightest breeze sounded like a skeleton's dying breath, multiplied by a hundred.  And a crowd was gathering in a show of excitement that made Elys absolutely sick.  She said this at every opportunity.

                "These people make me sick."

                "We heard you," said Cata.  "Why won't you people move?  We're trying to get to the front!"

                "We've been waiting longer.  The tower bell rang twenty minutes ago," said an Alhafran.  "There hasn't been a hanging in a year, so don't complain if you show up late and get a bad view."

                "You make me sick," Elys sneered at the man.

                "I can't see anything over all these people," said Cian, who had once claimed to be taller than he looked.

                "Excuse me," said Meg, tapping the man on the shoulder.  He turned around and saw the type of Amazonian woman that men in the city tend to dream up on boring days at work.  Meg hid her grin.  "If you could just crouch a little bit for a minute or two, I'd be happy to let you buy me a drink later."

                He did so instantly, not bothering to consider the bizarre request.  Meg leapt nimbly up, standing on his shoulders.  "I'm not sure the city's having a good influence on her," Cata said to Cian.

                "No one," Meg reported, looking out over the crowd.  "I see some a mechanic and his apprentice making sure the all the bits work, but no guards and no Padriac."

                "Well, that's good.  I guess," said Cata.  "We've got some time to think of a plan."

                "There he is," Meg added, suddenly.  "At, least, it looks like him.  They've got some kind of hood over his face-"

                "Oh, Spirits," Cian groaned.  "Thanks, Meg, we don't need to know more.  Let's move."

                Howl had left the city as fast as possible, heading southwest.  One of his wolfish traits was impressive endurance, especially when his pelt was on the line, and by the time Cata and the others had even seen the plaza where they'd find the crowd and the gallows, he was outside Alhafra and just getting up to speed.

                Yes.  This was where he was meant to be.  In the forest, as it grew dark, where he was the absolute height of the predators.  Animals hid as he blazed his trail through the undergrowth, he was invisible, he was lethal, he was fast, he- _what the hell was that?!_

                Howl tripped over a root while he was distracted.  The thing that had distracted him was a slightly fiery shape rocketing through the forest at about four times his speed, which turned and skidded to a stop just ahead of him.

                Zak looked at Howl as the wolfman got up, wishing silently that he had arms, because this would have been a great time to cross them.

                "You're that girl's horse," said Howl, eventually.  "Why aren't you with her?"

                "I was left behind to stand guard," Zak replied evenly, a statement he considered so ludicrous that it didn't count as lying.  Howl didn't seem to notice.  "But instead I decided to find you, because I saw you running earlier, away from them, and figured you could use some persuading."

                "To do what?" Howl demanded.

                "What you should," Zak answered.  "You're only free because they caught Padriac.  You owe him your life.  That means you go and save his."

                "I can't possibly get in there and save him with all those Alhafrans!"

                "That's not the point.  The point is that you try, or you _are a monster."_

                "But… you can't ask me to…" said Howl, weakly.

                "I'm not asking."

                "And it's almost sunset.  I'll never get back in time."

                "You'd go if you could?" asked Zak.

                "Of course," Howl said quickly, desperate to prove himself a good person, and not thinking all that clearly in the meantime.  Otherwise he might have remembered how Zak had arrived.

                "Then I have solutions to both your problems, Howl the lycanthrope," Zak announced.  Two shapes climbed up his neck onto his head and looked at Howl.  They were identical, but that didn't help much, because he'd never seen anything that looked like them before.  "This is Coal.  He'll get us back."

                The thing waved an ear, and then the other one leapt off Zak's head and approached Howl.  "And then," it said, in a slightly insane voice, "I'll help you out on the other part."

                "That's crazy," said Howl.

                "I get that all the time," the Mars Djinni replied.

                "Get out of the way!" Cata snapped, pushing another gawker aside as she and the others rushed toward the gallows.  Of course, this was a dense crowd, and made up of Alhafrans about to see someone get hung, so they were rushing at about a foot every ten seconds.

                "Hey, what's the problem?"

                "_Some of us are trying to watch the hanging."_

                "You people make me sick."

                "Elys, come _on.  Step aside!"_

                "Hey, I'm trying to see the execution!"

                "We're trying to _stop the execution!"_

                "Really?  Awesome!  Hey, guys, shove over.  This's gonna be great!"

                They weren't too far from the barrier around the platform now.  And Padriac had just reached the top.  He was dragged over to the trapdoor, where a noose waited, as well as at least a dozen Alhafran guards, none of them looking like they would be convinced by a heartfelt plea for mercy.

                "Ready!" shouted the sergeant.

                "Ready!" the executioner echoed.

                The hood was taken off with a generalised cheer, and the rope put around his neck.

                Elys thought fast, since the people at the front weren't interested in giving up their prime positions.  "Hey, who's that?" she called out loudly.

                The sergeant, who had raised his arm to signal the drop, twitched out of his vengeful rigidity.  He looked out in the crowd, quickly picking out a purple-haired girl who looked slightly puzzled.

                "This, little girl, is a notorious pirate, about to get what he so rightfully deserves," he said with some satisfaction, and raised his arm again.

                "Doesn't look especially piratish," Elys insisted, and the sergeant was thrown off-balance again

                "I assure you, little girl," the sergeant went on, "this is the most terrible of all pirates still living on Weyard.  He stole from Alhafra, he attacked our defenders ruthlessly, and-"

                "You said 'this'," Elys pointed out.  "Don't you mean 'he'?  He is a person, after all."

                The sergeant was getting uncomfortable.  "Yes, by a very technical definition, but in truth he is a monster no better than any common beast you might find in the wilderness, harming those who are in his way and taking whatever he wants."

                "Wolves aren't like that," Meg muttered.

                "Which, the guard or the description of monsters?" asked Cian quietly.

                "Both, but I meant they don't execute each other and say it's morality."

                "What's his name, then?" asked Elys.

                "Padriacazulen Briggs," the sergeant replied, "or at least _what in blazes is that_?!"  Howl had just dropped onto the gallows from the nearest rooftop, landing easily and slamming down the nearest guard.

                "Howl," Elys breathed.

                "Howl!" Cata shouted.

                "Howl?" asked Meg, shocked.

                "Howl," Cian affirmed with a grin.

                "That was weird," said Zak, clopping up behind them.  "Now that we're over the initial surprise, what say we get in there and make sure our new ally doesn't get turned into a rug?"

                "Where've you been?" asked Cata.

                "Exercising my independence at dangerous velocities," Zak replied, because it sounded good.

                Meg was already between the front row, over the wooden barrier, and in midair on her way up to the platform.  Howl had dropped another guard with his inhuman strength before any of them drew weapons, and then things went even crazier.

                Howl saw a crossbow raised, and lashed out.  "_Unleash Fever!_"  His allied Mars Djinni lent Howl strength, and Howl's clawed fist connected with a sudden rush of incredible heat and strange delusions.

                "Do it!" the sergeant shouted, collapsing as the world swam around him, and the lever was pulled, but even as she fenced with one guard, Meg's other blade was cutting the noose, allowing Padriac to fall straight through with more than a hard landing.  The executioner bent over, picked up an axe, which had been used for beheadings back before Alhafra became civilised, and looked up into Padriac's grinning face.  His stare was drawn inexorably down to the man's hands, which were now holding the remains of a knot he had been undoing for the last half hour.

                "_Another time, _after_ the universe ends," said Padriac, and smashed the executioner with a Riot Glove uppercut._

                "You okay?" called Cata, who was locked in battle with an Alhafran soldier.

                "Best I've _been all day," Padriac replied.  "Do we have a getaway plan?"_

                "Get away, really fast," Cata replied.

                "Ah," said Padriac, slightly worried but trying not to show it, "the improvisational."

                There was a sound like an entire book being ripped in half at the speed of sound, and Zak walked through what had once been the barrier around the gallows.  "You look terrible," he said.  "Come on."

                "So, what're you doing here?" asked Cian conversationally, parrying a thrust.

                "Would you believe I didn't want to look bad to a horse?" asked Howl, ducking and striking.

                "I just might," he admitted.

                "We're fine!" Zak shouted from the crowd, who were, not surprisingly, making way for a talking horse who kicked like a battering ram.  "Let's get moving!"

                Elys hadn't joined the fray, not being the melee type of person.  Instead, she had been focusing her mind and all the willpower she could, then mixing in a strong dose of hatred.  She threw her arms wide, facing the gallows, and called out to Mercury.  "_Tundra!"_

                "Flee!" Cian shouted, leaping off the platform, and the others followed quickly, though they didn't quite understand until they looked back.  Ice materialised from Psynergy above the wood, the air grew cold, and it fell like an entire winter in three seconds.  The gallows froze solid, covered in ice and snow.

                Meg dashed past the man who had played stepladder earlier, then skidded and came back.  "So sorry, got to run.  You can still buy that drink for me, but I won't be there, so feel free to drink it yourself."

                "Meg!" Cian shouted, and dragged her along as her caught up and went on.

                "_Do we have a plan?" asked Cata, hopefully as they ran._

                "Aside from run?  No," Cian told her, reluctantly.

                "How about 'run with the spirit of Mars giving us speed'?" Zak suggested.  "_Unleash Coal!_"  A second Mars Djinni ghost hovered above them, glowing red and spreading ethereal flames over the Knights, and then they were literally blazing through Alhafra.

                "Where to?" asked Meg, the most capable of controlling Coal's blessing.

                "South, possibly southwest," said Spring.  "The Tomegathericon is heading inland, probably up towards the Atteka Channel, where they can get quick transport north."

                "Tomegathericon?!" Howl repeated, who was amazed at what he had just done, but still alert enough to catch that name.

                "It's been stolen, and we're looking for it," said Cata, shortly.

                "A quest?" asked Howl.

                "That's right," Cata answered.

                "Involving terrible dangers and grand cities and suchlike?"

                "Yep."

                "And travelling far, far away from Osenia?"

                "Uh-huh."

                Even as they ran, twisting through the streets and heading for the wild lands -which were currently looking much safer- ignoring the exclamations of the Alhafrans around them, Howl could feel himself shaking, images rushing through his head.  Particularly the part when a guard had swung a broadsword at him, and he had ducked just fast enough to feel the wind of it at the tips of his pointed ears.

                He was shaking, but he was also grinning.  _What a rush._

                "Mind if I come along?" he asked, hopefully.

                They camped a few miles outside Alhafra that night, in a grove that was below the average of the land and surrounded by thick growth, so that no Alhafrans could find them unless they were within blasting distance.  And in any case, no Alhafran would be foolish enough to venture out of the city in the deep night.  Wolves howled in the distance, making Howl the target of a great many bad jokes.

                "Nice work, Zak," said Cata, stroking his neck as they rested by the fire.

                "By Venus, I think I was just congratulated.  Anyone have a calendar?  I want to mark today down," said Zak, looking among the Knights.

                "Hey, you've gotten credit before," Cata insisted.

                "Such as?"

                "In the Lemurian Ruins, when you buried Dullahan," she said quickly.

                "Are you sure?  I recall something closer to 'you idiot, you could have crushed us all'."

                "Well… we were in a hurry."

                "Tisiphone," Cian was telling Meg, pointing out the constellation above them.  "They say she was a Venus Adept and master of archery, but her husband didn't quite grasp the concept of fidelity so well, and… things went downhill from there."

                "Doesn't sound worthy of turning her into a constellation," Meg remarked.

                "Well, when it happened in the middle of a civil war, and when she turned against him she also turned the tide for the revolution," he added.

                "Okay, not bad," Meg admitted.  She lay back on the grass.  "What do you think the chances are that we'll get to be constellations?"

                "Well, you're certainly getting the hang of being a hero –ine," Cian added quickly.

                "Us?  You won't be able to see the moon for all the constellations showing our adventures," said Elys, laughing crazily.  She pointed at the sky a little unsteadily, just where the Luna River was brightest.  "I want to go right there."

                "Padriac…" asked Cata, warningly.

                "I didn't see the harm in a little celebration," he mumbled defensively.  "I could've been dead right now, you know."

                "Oh, I'll restore her in the morning," said Cian.  He held out a hand.

                "_No one ever finds the _other_ secret pocket," said Padriac, grinning as he threw the small container to the Lemurian._

                "Elys?" asked Cata, softly.  Her friend turned to her.

                "Which one of you just asked that?" Elys asked, looking straight at Cata.  "Hey, Cata, I want to talk to you about this Djinn thing.  Everyone's got one, an' I mean everyone, including the horse an' this new furry guy, but me, I've been with you since Daila, and I've got nothing.  What'm I doing wrong?"

                And Howl looked on, grinning widely -and lycanthropes can grin when they want to- at his new companions.  Life was looking much more interesting.  _It usually is when we're involved, said Fever, inside his head._

                A sound beyond the edge of human hearing echoed loudly in Howl's head.  He leapt to his feet, but in a crouch, turning about to try to position it better.  After a moment, he picked out four separate sources, all moving around their camp, somewhere in the brush.

                "There's something out there," Howl growled, and the others looked about, though they couldn't see much more than deep blackness.

                And miles ahead, though in the direction Spring had pointed them in Dullahan clutched the Tomegathericon firmly, knowing that his master had dealt with those supposed heroes at last.

**[Author's Notes]**  What can I say?  Push the button.  It is not an order, nor a request.  It simply what must be done.

\/  Down here.


	8. Out of the Fire, Into the Flood

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Eight: Out of the Fire, Into the Flood**

                "What kind of things are we talking about?" asked Cian, casting Restore on Elys.  The girl looked vaguely disappointed when the world came into sharp focus again; possibly she had been hoping the ground had spontaneously softened.

                "Predators," said Howl in a sure voice slightly tweaked by fear.  Humans didn't like werewolves, and wolves didn't like werewolves.  If there were any Psynergy-altered animals in the area, they would undoubtedly strike for him first.  Then another bit of information caught up to him.

                "Howl?  What is it?" asked Cata.

                "I've never heard of animals around here that walk on only two legs," he replied.

                "Alhafrans?" Padriac suggested.

                "Alhafrans aren't eight feet tall," said Meg, shaking her head.

                "What's your point?" asked the captain.

                "That thing is," she said.  The Knights turned.

                "No, that's definitely not an Alhafran," Cata agreed.

                "It's definitely not coming any closer, either," Meg added, and if she hadn't already drawn her weapons and put on a tempered-steel expression, she would have then.

                The creature was indeed eight feet tall, and looked as unnatural as they could imagine.  Its face was a smoothed-out combination of wolf and dragon, its arms were thicker than Padriac's neck, and aside from the black bat wings, it was a bizarre mixture of blue, pink, and an incredibly cheerful yellow.  The back-bent legs and hooves gave it an even more demonic presence, beyond the soulless depths of its eyes.

                "Cian?" asked Cata, slowly backing away from it while drawing her sword and gathering their packs.  "Ever seen something like that before?  Ever?  With encyclopaedic knowledge about its weak points, maybe?"

                "No," said Cian, backing away much more quickly to load Zak's saddlebags.  "And that tells me that finding out what it is would be a risky endeavour."

                "Why?" asked Elys, still a little disappointed at the sharpness of indifferent reality.

                "Because I won't be ready when a huge venomous spike shoots out of its forehead or whatever it does," the Lemurian explained.  "It's a survival principle."  It was fortunate that they were fully ready to move and the creature hadn't approached any closer, because Cian chose that moment to cast Douse and extinguish the fire.

                The moment the firelight vanished, the creature screeched a terrible howl and rushed for them.  Cata didn't hop onto Zak's back, knowing that he was carrying enough already, but grabbed the reins anyway and fled.  They were unfamiliar in her hand, never having had to use them before, but she knew Zak's night vision wasn't up to figuring terrain.

                As the others ran, Padriac stepped into the predator's path and dealt an incredible straight punch into its forehead, and the Riot Glove was probably the only thing that kept his fingers whole. The creature did hesitate, though, possibly just shocked at the idea of something daring to strike it.

                "_What on all the _accursed_ continents of the world _are_ you?" Padriac exclaimed.  The monster's only reply was to raise a hoof and smash Padriac in the chest with it, sending the captain rolling.  "Ah.  Unfriendly.  'M __deeply familiar with those."_

                "Padriac's still back there!" Elys protested as Cian tried to hurry her along.

                "He's been taking care of himself for years, he'll be fine," said Cian.  "But if he's got to worry about us trying to save him, well, who knows what trouble we'll end up in."

                "Where'd Cata go?" asked Meg, glancing back at the others.

                Zak tried to look innocent.  "I figured she was just… um…"

                "_Unleash Hail!" Padriac shouted, and a rush of ice rose up to crash into his foe.  It shook off the cold easily, but the impact of the piratical Djinni's attack seemed to shake it, and Padriac leapt to his feet as well as a lifelong sailor could leap, dashing off into the dark woods._

                "What the-" Cata yelped, a half-second before the collision.

                "_What are you doing?" Padriac spluttered, climbing out of the groundcover with leaves in his hair._

                "Helping," said Cata, defensively.

                A red flicker of light split the shadows and a sapling toppled, along with an avalanche of leaves and twigs, revealing the bizarrely coloured beast, its eyes glowing a terrible violet and a sudden blast of hot breath escaping its jaw.

                "Well that's interesting," Padriac murmured.  "_Very interesting."_

                "_Storm Ray!" Cata shouted, blasting the creature to little effect.  A few trees around them also caught the blast, but they were too quickly scorched to catch fire.  It did, however, let out a cry that sounded like a wolf howling in pain in an echo valley and lash out at them again.  Padriac rolled, and took Cata with him._

                "_That was not an _especially_ helpful sort of _help_," he commented._

                "I had to do something!" she protested, getting up again.  "You were just muttering about how interesting it was!"

                "I'll _explain once we're safe- _flee_ now, discuss _later_," the captain replied._

                "Oh, right.  _Unleash Zephyr!_"  They shot off between the trees, leaving a mere wake of rustling plants.  The monster let out another howl in the growing distance behind them.  Cata might have felt less relieved if she had known what it was complaining about.  The thing was beginning to worry that it wouldn't be able to catch up in time to join in the destruction.

                "You're okay!" Cian said happily as Cata and Padriac caught up with the others.

                "Yeah, Padriac and Hail hit it hard enough to slow it down so I could give it a good blast of lightning, and then we left it in the dust," she reported.

                "_Something like that," Padriac allowed._

                "Let's keep moving," said Meg.  "I don't know how quick they are, but I'd hate for the last thing I think to be 'very fast, it seems'."

                "I am so in favour of that," Howl added.

                "Humans do sleep, right?" asked Coal, perched on Zak's shoulders.  "I've been left out of the whole civilization loop for a few centuries, but I was pretty sure."

                "All in favour of ignoring the Djinn?" asked Elys.

                "Arr, ye're walking a thin plank!" Hail growled.

                "Sounds good," Cata agreed.

                "It's soundin' good to load the lot o' yer into the cannons, too, but y'don't see me _doin__' it!" Hail roared.  
                "Then can we get moving again?" asked Howl, hopefully.  "I don't mean to order anyone around, but we're being pursued by terrible monstrous beasts, and that plays hell with my predator instincts."_

                They did take off into the night again, at a less frantic pace, and kept it up for at least a paranoid week- that is, an hour, but it felt a hundred-fifty times longer because every rustle of motion in the forest caused them to twitch a foot into the air and reach for weapons.

                Eventually, when Cata was thinking that they should look for another campsite for the night, the rest of their dilemma made itself known.  There was no clear path through the forest; the Knights had been stomping through as quickly and quietly as possible through brush and the occasionally unpleasant bramble.

                The result of this was that there was no side of the path for the other two beasts to leap out from, but they did their best anyway.  One of the unnatural creatures dropped from a tree, the other crashed into their midst and swept one clawed hand at Cian's face while kicking out at Meg.

                The Lemurian parried the attack with his sabre, and was surprised to notice that it was actually a parry, rather than the hand-removing block he had hoped for.  The creature's arms were plated with some kind of built-in armor.

                Fortunately for Cian, it had made the mistake of attacking Meg in the middle of the night after a very long day, most of which had been spent inside a city, and an ugly one at that.  Her exhaustion was washed away by a tide of righteous fury, and her swords seemed to spring to her hands, wreathing themselves in fire.

                An incredible frenzy of strikes followed as Meg drove the monster back out of the group and into the brush.  Her blades wove too quickly to set anything ablaze, aided by a recent rainfall in this area, though a few branches were reduced to scorched stumps.

                And her flaming swords had another advantage.  The monster back at their camp had only charged when the fire was put out, and now its retreat in the face of Meg's blazing brands gave more evidence to her theory- they were mortally afraid of fire.

                Howl caught onto this quickly enough, and quickly took the pressure off Cata, who was having enough difficulty keeping her sword on guard against the other creature's attacks.  The lycanthrope rushed forward, called out "_Unleash Fever!_" and dealt a burning blow to the side of its head with his claws.

                "Keep going!" Cata called to the others.

                "Already gone!" Elys replied from further ahead.  "I think we're coming up on a river!"

                "Oh, wonderful, more water," groaned Zak.  He kicked at the delusion-afflicted monster once with a hind hoof and then took off toward Elys' voice before it could think of retaliating.

                "That or become steaks," Cian pointed out.

                "_Move it, people!"_

                "I'd rather stay and fight to the death, thank you.  Do you know what a wet lycanthrope smells like?  And I'm the one with the most sensitive nose here," Howl pointed out.  Behind him, one of the creatures extended a long blade from its forearm.

                "Duck!" Meg warned, and before she had even finished Howl was crouched, just dodging a wicked stab.  Practically blurring with the speed, he rose again and drove his fist into the beast's neck.  It was an unstoppable strike, like watching an iron bar extend into toffee, and the monster collapsed backwards, clutching at its throat.

                "He's not human," Padriac mumbled.

                "Oh thank you for noticing," Howl shot back.

                "Can we get to the water now?!" demanded Fever.

                "You're excited for a Mars Djinni facing a river," Cian remarked.

                "Don't get him started," said Spring, "or we'll be hearing about the time he was in Prox for the next week."  Confused, but still very clear on whether or not he wanted to stay in the same area as an armored monster with hooves and blades and an apparent lack of interest in sitting down and working out issues through constructive conversation, Cian made for the direction Elys had gone in.

                By the time he reached the river, with the others following close behind, Elys had crafted a large ice raft, and was keeping it as steady as possible while they got on.  Zak's weight sent it tipping, but a quick push into the water with Mercury Psynergy forced them even again, and they started moving.

                "We're not heading for the Great Western Sea, are we?" asked Cata.

                "That'd be a big help, wouldn't it?  No, the river flows north from here," Elys replied.

                "Fast, too," Zak noted nervously.

                "Good.  Maybe we'll outrun them," Cata said, looking back at where they had left the bank.

                "Outfloat," Elys corrected her, absentmindedly.  "I'm exhausted."

                "You're going to try to sleep on an ice floe?" asked Meg, disbelieving.

                "No.  I'm going to succeed."

                "And if we start to tip over?" the huntress went on.

                "Capsize," Padriac added.  The motion of the waves was making him rather sleepy as well.

                "I'll handle it," said Cian.  "Try to rest, at least."

                "I'm worried about sticking," Meg muttered.

                But as they travelled further and further down the river, the Knights fell silent.  Elys did manage to fall asleep, leaning against Padriac and Howl, while Cian kept an eye on the river, Meg scowled at the "whole Mercury-infested situation", and Cata tried to figure out what was bothering her about the creatures.  She had drafted Zak to help, for the simple reason that he had nothing else to do except try not to shift his weight much.

                "Possibly the fact that they were trying to kill us?" he suggested.  "That's a good one."

                "No, besides that," Cata insisted.

                "What else do you need once you've got 'trying to kill us'?"

                "I mean there was something sort of familiar about them, Zak.  Something like… you know when you're trying to remember a word, and you knew it until just a second ago, but suddenly it's gone?"

                "Oh, yeah.  What's that called… it's on the tip of my tongue…"

                "Zak!"

                "Well, what do you expect from a horse?  I tend to focus on 'they're trying to kill us'!  I'm not a natural predator!"

                "I'm trying to figure out what it's from, I mean.  Do you remember any stories about dragon-goat-bat things in bright yellow and pink?"

                "Not really, but if you ask Elys, I bet she'll have a whole story about how they prey on travellers and in another day one of them'll be a Knight of Alchemy and the whole thing'll have been a misunderstand-"

                "Druj."  The word fell like a hammer onto a forge.  Cata whirled around for a moment before she noticed that Meg was looking at them.  "I remember from when I was really little.  My parents were probably Mars Adepts, like me.  And they told ghost stories about creatures called Druj that used to prey on the Mars Clan, way up north.  I had forgotten until you mentioned stories just now, but they were a sort of evil dragon, more or less like we just saw."

                "Great.  Druj."  Cata looked around the river, at the forested banks that were pure black in the night, mixed with shadows from the moonlight that somehow didn't manage to brighten things up at all.  No one spoke for a while, just waited as the ice raft carried them further along.

                Once the sounds of voices were gone, the rest of the world seemed to grow louder.  The waves sloshed against the ice with impossible volume, like the wet footsteps of an underwater beast.  Cata knew that if it had been footsteps, it wouldn't have been possible to hear them coming from underwater, but she was struck by the sort of sudden irrational fear that she hadn't felt for years.

                Cata was the kind of person who always looked.  If you told her that the door in front of her led to room containing the most horrible thing in the universe, one that would send her into a screaming insanity for the rest of her life, she'd take a quick peek through the keyhole.  And now, suddenly wondering if something could be following them underwater, she crept over to the edge and looked down.

                There was nothing but black water, of course, and her own spectral reflection from the moonlight, wavering a little in the ripples.  And the moon far overhead, nearly full and shining brightly.  A darkness crossed it, and for a moment Cata wondered if it had been a shadow or just a wave.

                That was answered quickly when the water ahead of them seemed to explode.  She spun to see a huge burst of droplets fly from the surface, which all stopped in mid-air and seemed to be sucked together, shaping into a strange sort of wall.  Cata had seen the way frost formed on windows during that one frigid winter a few years ago, when it actually snowed in Daila, but this was on a scale a few hundred times bigger, and without the glass.  Instead the river was suddenly blocked up ahead by a net of ice.

                "What the heck is that?" shouted Meg, leaping to her feet.

                "Elys," Padriac hissed urgently.  "Time to get up, lass."

                "Mph," she replied, definitively.

                He glared at her, a tactic that was lost on someone with her eyes closed.  "You _do_ realise we're all about to _die_."

                "You'll handle it," she assured him, somewhat incoherently.

                The captain continued glaring for a moment.  "If we _don't find a way to stop these 'Druj', __Daila is going to be over_run_ with monsters, _within_ the hour," he told her, matter-of-factly.  A half second later, Elys was on her feet, firing Ice Psynergy.  "Yes, _well_ done, taught that shrub a lesson it _won't_ forget, now how about the wall we're about to hit?"_

                "If you don't mind, I'm trying to concentrate!" Meg snarled, her eyes closed.  Mars Adept or not, Psynergy wasn't her strong suit, and she was frustrated by her failure so far to gather enough power to break the wall.

                "Concentrate _faster," said Cata, nervously.  Lightning was a dangerous thing around water, she knew, so her own Psynergy wasn't going to help._

                "I'm TRYING!" Meg shouted, and a flare burst from her hands.  Unfortunately, instead of blasting the wall up ahead, it dropped straight down and carved the ice raft in two.

                The two parts immediately rolled over, dropping the Knights in the river without ceremony.  Cata fought hard enough to rise to the surface quickly, gasped for air, and hit the wall.  It reached down under the water, probably all the way to the bottom.

                Meg was flailing at the ice wall, so red from anger and exertion that Cata was surprised steam wasn't rising from the water around her, but the ice was too thick, and she could only chip so fast.

                "That's not working," she said.

                "Do you have a better idea?" the Mars Adept replied.  A motion at the edge of her view caught Cata's attention, a Druj landing at the edge of the river.  Only slightly surprised that the minor wings on the beast's back let it fly, she watched helplessly as it gestured at the river again.  Back the way they came, a wave rose up and froze, turning into a wall of sharp crystals as it did.

                "Megacool," Cian muttered.  "I hate Megacool."  The frozen spike wall rolled toward them on the current, and for a moment Cata's mind was filled with images of very unpleasant futures not unlike a huge garlic crusher.

                Then Padriac rose out of the water, holding Elys with one arm, and lashed out repeatedly with the other, breaking the ice wall wherever he could,  The Riot Gloves were strong, as was he, but there was far too much for him to destroy in just a few moments.

                What he did manage was to create a small safe area, so that when the Megacool blades did reach the frost wall, the Knights were simply trapped inside an icy alcove.  One that Cata was worried to notice was shrinking as the two barricades ground together.

                An insane plan occurred to her, the sheer danger striking her as a sign that it would probably work.  Near-suicide was never a wasted effort.  "Everyone grab hold of someone else!" Cata called to the others, and they did, forming a chain of slowly drowning Adepts.  Bracing herself, Cata shouted "_Storm Ray!"_

                Lightning lanced down from the sky, blasting the river.  Sudden heat fractured the ice and literally blew most of it apart as ice was transformed into vapour, but Cata didn't notice.  She was focusing as hard as she could on calling the Psynergy to herself.  A Jupiter Adept shouldn't be hurt by her own Psynergy, surely, but the others were in trouble… unless she could do this.

                Electricity crackled through the water, promising harm to anyone in the area, but whenever it touched one of the others, Cata's call drew it in, along the line of her friends until she could absorb that power.  It still hurt a little, but it was better than flash-frying the lot of them.

                When the lights had faded away -the lightning, at least, Cata expected she'd be seeing rainbow-coloured spots for the next few years- the Adepts didn't waste much time being shocked.  They rushed for shore and dragged themselves up, A couple of the unluckier ones coughing water.

                Meg was alert instantly, and fencing with the Druj a few moments later.  Her swords hissed for a moment as their auras of flames boiled the last traces of water, and the Druj made a similar sound when a pair of firebrands appeared in its face.

                She led with a double slash high, then spun, stabbed low, and swept the other across to fend off its attack- except that the Druj hadn't attacked.  Every step of the routine, it had simply given away ground, apparently without worry.  Confused, Meg looked up at its eyes, and instantly regretted it.  Both black orbs flashed white as stars, with all the colours of the spectrum at their edges.  The blinding light was bad enough in the night, but worse were the rest of the Evil Eye's effects.

                All around Meg's feet, grey shapes rose like smoke from the ground, but smoke tended to at least _look less harmful.  It might destroy your lungs and ability to breathe, but at least it didn't normally look like it would take any pleasure in it.  These looked like they would be doing bhangra dances on your larynx._

                The spirits clawed at her legs, climbing all around her, whispering malevolence, sneaking into the dark places in her mind where they could hide for as long as they wanted, slowly destroying her from the inside, they were unstoppable, they were invincible, they would defeat her…

                "_Serupento__ Fyumu!" cried a voice Meg didn't know, and a blazing shape dove in a spiral around her, catching the shadowy ghosts in its mouth before it struck the ground and exploded in a fountain of sparks.  Freed from the spirits' curse, Meg renewed her attacks, scorching lines along the Druj's yellow armored skin._

                A moment later, a red-white bolt darted in from behind her, nearly catching the fringe of her short hair, and struck the Druj between the eyes.  It staggered back, apparently immobilized by this assault.  Meg spun, in case the attack had only hit the Druj because it missed her, but found only a strange woman standing in the moonlight.

                "Move quickly," she said, with a strong accent from the Far Northeast.  "Your friends have already set out for the nearest village of Anemos."

                "Who are you?" Meg asked, sounding more indignant than grateful.

                "I am of the Yu Clan," the woman replied, "and have not the time for any more words.  I will see to these abominations.  You must go on."

                "Um… right," said Meg, off-balance.  She headed into the forest, in the direction given, only turning at the last moment to add "Thank you."  The Yu Clan, from what little Meg knew of it, was a family of travelling protectors, people who rarely asked for anything in return for their services.  All Adepts, all self-sufficient, but to encounter one just when she was needed, so far from Izumo, seemed unlikely.  There was something very strange happening that night.

                "Did you see-" Meg began when she caught up with the others.

                "We saw her," Cata replied.  "And we were just as weirded out as you look."

                "I wouldn't be much of a _captain if I trusted someone who went around saving lives for _free_," said Padriac, and Hail gave an "Arr" of agreement._

                "Then you can trust me, I expect," said a voice in the shadows ahead, and suddenly Elys found an arrowhead's point touching her neck.  "Because I'm offering not to kill you in exchange for knowing what you're doing in our realm."

**[Author's Notes]**  Cliffhangerlicious, isn't it?  But things are almost never what they seem… _almost.  Review if you want the next chapter (and answers) soon._


	9. Origin of the Inevitable

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Nine:  Origin of the Inevitable**

                "I'd really like it if you'd take that away from my friend's throat," Cata informed the stranger, but as she moved to cut the bowstring, the rest of the group moved too, followed by the archer, and the bow sang out twice as the Knights fumbled in the darkness.

                Padriac let out a yelp as he discovered -halfway to the ground- that one of the arrows had nailed his boot to the earth, though the lack of pain suggested that his foot had been spared.  He tumbled into Cian as he fell, sending the Lemurian sprawling as well, and another cry signalled that Meg was, for the moment, unable to help.

                Howl was fast, but a blast of Psynergy from the archer created a gust of wind that blasted him off his feet.  He landed a long way back, thankfully just missing a tree trunk but momentarily stunned.

                Cata swung wildly, not intending to harm but not too interested in avoiding it, either.  Even if she might have, there was no reason to worry.  The archer bent like a reed in high winds under and away from every strike, twisted around, drew a third arrow…

                And they were in stalemate.  Cata stood, sword ready to thrust the short distance between her and the other; while the archer was already in perfect position- just letting go of the string would set the arrow in a very short and final flight.

                Elys, standing a foot or two away, flicked her wrist and snapped her fingers, a darkly amused expression on her face.  A second later, it was replaced with a smile.  "Wow.  I _am_ getting to be good at that."  Cata's attention flickered away, the archer slightly changed her aim and let go.

                The string stayed motionless, the arrow fell vertically to the ground.  The unknown archer studied the unmoving string for a moment, then tapped it.  The frozen string broke and fell into bits.

                "Want to try talking this time?" asked Elys.

                "Not with you.  And don't try any false stories.  You're not tan enough to be Naribwe, and you don't have any Kibombo markings.  You're _Alhafrans," she spat.  Adjusting to night again after the blinding lightning not so long ago, Cata saw that the stranger was a girl, no older than her, perhaps younger, looking at them the way most people looked at leeches._

                "Actually, we aren't," said Padriac, having pulled his boot free and now working the arrow out.

                "I'm not especially inclined to believe you," she replied.

                "Well, when you're holding the sword, you can make decisions like that," said Cata, graciously.  "Me, Elys, and Zak the horse are all from Daila."

                "Again with 'Zak the horse'," grumbled Zak the horse.

                "Padriac is part Lemurian, mostly Champa, and a dash of pirate lightly seasoned with crazy, Cian's full-blooded Lemurian, Howl is a w- a lycanthrope, and Meg… I'm not sure what Meg is," Cata admitted.

                "I'm not sure _where Meg is," Cian said, as the Knights realised that she had vanished._

                "Here," a voice gasped, and Howl dug through the undergrowth for a moment before finding her, lying almost limp.  He lifted her clear of the brush, and suddenly they understood what had caused such a drain in her usual fighting spirit.  Meg's left hand was clamped firmly around her other wrist, and her right hand had turned white.  For a moment Cata thought she was actually gripping hard enough to cut off the circulation before she realised that there was blood seeping between her fingers.

                "Elys!" Cata called as Padriac let go a subvocal stream of pirate-speech, half of which was totally incomprehensible, and the other half Cata wished she didn't understand.

                "Nothing," Elys replied, staring at her hand in frustration.  "I've been using too much Psynergy recently, haven't had time to gather any more."

                "Let me," said the girl, shouldering between Cata and Padriac to reach the fallen huntress.  She pried Cata's hand off, revealing a sight that made most of the Knights flinch away, but covered it just as quickly with her own hand.  Fingers locked firmly on Meg's gashed wrist, she spoke very quietly, and blue light shone under her palm.  It was still a reddish mess when the girl let go, but the flesh had sealed.

                "That was Ply," Cian said.

                "Full points for comparative Psynergy recognition," the girl muttered, still looking over the site of the former injury.

                "But I _saw you use Slash on Howl," the Lemurian went on._

                "_Saw it," grumbled Howl sarcastically, rubbing his neck.  "Well, that certainly does prove things.  __Saw me get hit with it.  I admit, _I_ didn't see it, I was too busy closing my eyes to prepare for impact."_

                "Right on both counts," said the girl, apparently deciding that she had patched Meg up properly.

                "Ply is Mercury.  Slash is Jupiter.  What's going on?  What kind of Adept are you?"

                "Ah.  Now we get to an actual question."  She stood and looked Cian in the eye.  He was surprised by the force of her gaze, not like the ocean but like the incredible blue of the sky on rare occasions.  "Jupiter, to my core.  No doubt you've got another question coming," she said, before he could speak.  "But I'd like to believe that you aren't from Alhafra, and if you aren't, then you probably don't deserve whatever has been happening to you.  You look half-dead, and drowned most of the rest of the way."

                "If you're thinking of trying something-" Cata began.

                "I'm thinking of showing you the way to Contigo, where you can recover from whatever ordeals you've been through and decide what to do next."  She looked over at Padriac, who was about to speak.  "Lynn, disciple of Anemos, and thank you for being about to ask."

                With that, Lynn turned and started into the woods again, gesturing for the others to follow.  Her last sentence clicked with Cata, who followed a little reluctantly.  "Mind reader," the Dailan muttered darkly.

                The woman from the Yu Clan looked over the husk of a former Druj.  The third was still running around somewhere in the forest, but she wasn't overly concerned.  This second one had fallen easily enough after sufficient blasting with Mars Psynergy.  What worried her was the way it had partially disintegrated, but left a sort of carapace behind, like a snake shedding a thick skin.

                Any other Psynergy-corrupted animal would completely 'grey out' when slain, due to the unbinding of chaotic energies it had been holding, but these had not, making her wonder precisely where the difference lay.

                "No animals look like this," Flash pointed out.

                "I know," the woman replied.  "That worries me too."

                "Are you thinking…"

                "I'd rather not," she said with a sigh, "but I have to admit that you seem to be right."  She stood, and looked down at the slightly charred shell of the Druj.  She would have to find and destroy the other before it could cause any damage to people or the forest.  These creatures were good at destruction.  They had been optimised for it.  "These 'Druj' are not twisted animals.  They were made."

                The city of Contigo confused Meg from the beginning, simply because her natural dislike of cities didn't seem to catch it.  This was a place where the city wasn't built to defy nature so much as provide a place to be while basking in it.  The earth was sandy, but plants still grew in it, and they hadn't been cut away between the buildings of the city.  Nor were the common paths bare, but carpeted with bright green grass.

                Lemuria was said to be the greatest of all the cities, like a jewel risen from the ocean depths.  But Cata had to admit that it was imposing -at least at the distance she had seen it from- where Contigo was soothing.  The Lemurians no doubt had a larger city, with more people, breathtaking artwork, and mightier buildings, but it seemed placed on top of the land, a different layer, while Contigo almost seemed to have grown out of the earth.

                "I'm rather surprised that the central city of the Jupiter Clan would be so filled with plants.  They're aligned with Venus, after all," Cian remarked.

                "It feels a little claustrophobic at times," Lynn agreed, "but the elders say that it's useful for higher meditation to mix opposites, and you're right, Venus is about as opposite as we can get to ourselves."  She grinned, closed her eyes, and raised her face to catch the earliest rays of sunlight and first winds.  "And you would not believe the way it smells in springtime.  The aromas of a thousand different flowers on every street- and aromas are very much within Jupiter's realm."

                There couldn't have been a more different place from Alhafra than Contigo, Meg decided as they entered the edges of the city, and maybe that meant that it wasn't too bad.  Maybe even allowable.  But she would meet a few more Contigans before making any real judgments.

                "What are all those rocks?" asked Elys, pointing at the various large crystals that seemed to be popular decoration for homes, and occasionally were just placed at a crossroads on a tall pedestal.  "It's a nice glow you get from them."

                "Oh, yes, those are Psynergy Stones.  When the sun goes down they start to glow, keeping the city a little brighter, and providing people with a little Psynergy boost if they need it during the day."  Lynn slowed, finally stopping in the middle of the path for no obvious reason.  "But the sun's already rising.  What do you mean, 'nice glow'?"

                "Well, not glowing, really," Elys amended.  "Just, well… sort of… glowing.  Differently."

                "You can see their aura of Psynergy?" Lynn asked.

                "You can't?" Elys responded.

                "I can't," Zak added.

                "No one can except for a few very experienced elders.  The ones who have been meditating on Psynergy for decades and become masters of the arts of Jupiter," said Lynn.

                "Cool," said Elys, grinning.  "I can knit, too.  Do you have knitting monks?"

                "You're not from Alhafra, you've got a werewolf, a Lemurian, some kind of amazon woman, a talking horse, and someone who's probably a pirate-"

                "_Noble pirate," Padriac interjected._

                "And now it turns out that one of the two potentially normal people can see Psynergy auras without practicing.  You people are strange -no offence- and I think the elders are going to want to meet you.  Come on," said Lynn, waving them down a different path.

                "Did I misunderstand her, or did she imply that this would all make sense if we were from Alhafra?" asked Cata.

                "Listen to the nice ruthless archer healer Jupiter Adept and maybe we'll get a chance to sleep today," said Cian, waving for Cata to get moving.

                The regular sanctum of Contigo was nowhere near the grand scale of the Anemos Sanctum that made them known even in Daila, but that was just as well, since Anemos Sanctum was also at the centre of a massive crater to the east of the city, one whose origin was lost to older times.  Possibly some of the elders of Contigo knew what had happened, but if they did, they were good at keeping secrets.

                The newer sanctum was much like the ones found anywhere else on Weyard, if somewhat larger.  Lynn swung open the stone doors without effort, which suggested that she either had tempered steel bones or there was some trick of mechanics involved- the latter seemed more likely, Jupiter Adepts were often very creative.

                Inside there was the usual Great Healer's altar, currently unattended, but beyond there, the sanctum's single main room stretched out into a wide, airy space with meditation mats spread across the floor.  At the far end of the room, on a slightly higher section of the floor, two of the mats were occupied by Contigan elders, who Lynn approached steadily but cautiously.

                The woman, many year older than the man and with tan skin that suggested some part of her ancestry led to the shaman tribes of Hesperia, was apparently not as at-ease as her companion, and her eyes snapped open as the Knights approached, a healthy distance behind Lynn.

                "Cata," said the woman.  "And Elys, and Cian… and you've left Zak outside, I see, that's unfortunate.  Perhaps I can meet with him later, he seems like such a nice young man."  Her eyes swept across Padriac, Meg, and Howl.  "I'm afraid I don't know you so well, but I hope we have a chance to correct that before you have to leave again.  Lynn, did you bring them in?"

                The Knights had completely frozen in mid-step, eyes wide, expressions shocked, and completely at a loss.  Lynn wasn't in much better condition, except that she seemed to at least understand what was happening.  "Yes, Phoveia, I did.  How did you know…?"

                "You know the capacity of Jupiter's Psynergy, Lynn," said Phoveia.  "I have long been a wielder of the Fourth Sight, the power of prediction.  And I have known from when you were only a small child that a day like this would come."

                "Wait, wait, who said Jupiter Adepts had the power of prediction?" asked Cata, stepping forward.  Lynn looked worried for a moment, but Phoveia simply smiled like a grandmother faced with a curious child.

                "Oh, Cata, always so quick, always so forward," said the elder woman.  "In Daila many skills of the Adepts are forgotten, or believed only legendary.  I hope one day you can tell your people of the gifts they may not even know hover at their fingertips."

                Cata blushed.  "I can start with me.  I'm a Jupiter Adept."

                "Yet I don't hear your thoughts any clearer than the others," Phoveia observed.  Cata mumbled something quietly.  "I'm sorry?"

                "I can't use Mind Read," she said, just fractionally louder.

                "Dear Cata, don't be so quick to judge your own abilities!  Most of us can't swim when we first step into the river, and I know you did not grow up in any sort of gathering of Jupiter Adepts.  Children in Contigo are taught the most basic skills before they can even speak, and those lead to the development of Mind Read.  Your parents wouldn't have known what to do."

                "So I can't Mind Read and I can't predict," Cata summarized, slowly sinking into the lethargy of exhaustion.  Sounds were becoming duller, the world was becoming detached.

                "Not at all.  Mind Read may be more difficult for you to learn now that you're older, I confess, but the skill will grow in time."  Phoveia smiled again benevolently.  "And no one can teach anyone to predict the future.  That skill is as strong in you as it is in me.  But I do believe you were brought here on a different matter?"  Cata blushed again and stepped back, a little sluggishly, letting Lynn take the centre of attention.

                "It's all right," said Lynn to Cata.  "But I do want to know how you can already know so much about her, and the coming of all of them to Contigo.  Does your prediction tell you so much?"

                "Some of it does.  I admit that I have paid particular attention to Clotho's greatest art, the telling of the lifeline, which certainly helps me learn more about your pasts."

                "Perhaps you should not be saying so much to strangers," commented the younger male 

'elder'.  It was the first thing he had said, and he still hadn't bothered to open his eyes.

                "Perhaps not," Phoveia admitted, but without the slightest severity.  "No one truly knows what foreseeing the future is for, if it cannot be changed, and how we see it, if it can.  I would not wish to foil Jupiter's plans."

                "Can you tell me- all of us -why they're here?" asked Lynn.

                "Of course.  I believe it is vital that I do so."  She looked saddened for a moment, but hopeful, too.  "They have come to Contigo, Lynn, because they must leave with you among their number, and not doing so would doom them all."  Lynn went silent, as frozen as the Knights had been by Phoveia's greeting, and so the elder went on.  "I'm afraid so," -here Cata guessed Phoveia had read Lynn's mind- "the time has come for you to leave the home of the Jupiter Clan, to protect us all."

                "Protect the clan…?" Lynn mumbled.

                "The Tomegathericon," said Cian.  "It is as dangerous as we have all feared, then?"

                "Perhaps worse.  I know not if it is even possible for you to escape this quest with your lives, brave Knights of Alchemy.  But Lynn must go with you if there is to be any hope."

                "Don't I have a choice?" asked Lynn, not seeming at all like the one-girl-skirmish they had met in the forest.

                "Yes.  Even no choice at all is still a choice.  But there is no safe road."

                "We could certainly use your help.  It would take a lot of the pressure off me," said Elys, pretending to scowl at Cian, who looked away.

                "And there is something else to consider.  Lynn, set aside the Clan's laws for a moment and show them why you were allowed to take the Dragon's Trial at so young an age," said Phoveia.  The Knights didn't understand what the elder meant in the slightest, but they were certainly getting to be familiar with what happened next.

                Rather smugly, setting aside her uncertainty, Lynn held out a hand at arm's length, palm up.  She grinned as purple light sparked together, taking shape and coming to rest on her hand.  "This is Gale, a Jupiter Djinni."

                "Gale!" shouted Zephyr happily, and the chorus was taken up by the other Djinn, until all six of them were out and greeting the newcomer Djinni, speaking too fast for any of the humans in the room to believe that they were conversing in any mortal language.

                Lynn was shocked again, suddenly faced with a cloud of Djinn all scrambling to climb onto her arm or flutter around her head.  Phoveia burst out laughing, but there was no hint of malice to it, simply wonder at the flood of elementals.

                "You have more in common with them than you might have guessed, Lynn."

                Slowly, still a little reluctantly, Lynn nodded.  That was how it went, was it?  One day she's been allowed to take the final trial to join the higher ranks of the Jupiter clan, despite her youth, the next she has to leave her home and head off with strangers to find the legendary Tomegathericon.  Strangers with Djinni, admittedly, which made them less strange, but it was still jarring.

                "When do we leave?" she asked eventually.

                "Not yet," said Cian, wearily.

                "Nowhere near yet," Howl agreed.

                "Maybe after a few hours sleep," said Meg.

                "Several," Elys amended.

                "_And at least one _good_ meal," said Padriac._

                "Several," Howl added, hopefully.

                "But first…" said Cata, looking rather bleary now, "I believe there is the matter of us allowing you entrance.  And so, in keeping with the tradition of the ancient and honourable traditions of the bro… sist… siblinghood of knights errantry, you must defeat me in single combat.  We shall meet at dawn."

                "Cata, it's already dawn," said Elys.

                "Really?  Excellent!  Choose your implements of deconstructification!"

                "Speaking of which, we've been awake since dawn yesterday," said Cian, stepping forward and putting a hand of Cata's shoulder to pull her back.  She shrugged it off, and the passive struggle continued for a moment before Lynn stepped in front of Cata, trying not to smirk.

                She raised a hand.  "_Sleep_," said the Jupiter Adept.  Ethereal sheep rained from the roof in a very small space, vanishing into the ground, and Cata staggered backward a step before collapsing completely.  The concentrated woollen downpour had placed her solidly in the land of dreams, or at least snores, and Lynn looked to the others for judgment.  "How was that?"

                "A solid victory, I'd say," Cian decided.

                "Artful," Meg agreed.

                "_Especially the bit about _not_ mentioning your _rather_ unusual tactics," Padriac commented._

                "You think it was underhanded?" asked Lynn, slightly concerned.

                "Yes."  The pirate leaned in slightly and winked.  "You'll fit in like gold in a pirate's pocket."

                The Knights stayed another full day in Contigo, gathering their strength after what amounted to a two-day run across who knew how many miles of city, land, and river.  The city was a wondrous place, and it was easy to believe Lynn's statement about the aromas of Contigo in springtime- even now, as Weyard's northern demidisc was heading into autumn, the city of the Jupiter Clan was filled with the scent of oranges from the orchard harvest.

                Lynn's last day in Contigo was much simpler than Cata's would have been if the other Knights had appeared in Daila.  As was apparently common in the Jupiter Clan, her parents were off with a band of other Jupiter Adepts, trading with other cities and taking stock of the world to the east.  They would still not return for perhaps over a month, and Phoveia insisted that Lynn could not afford to slow the Knights down.

                Instead, she ensured that she had done everything that she had been required to do, all her promises were kept (or at least postponed) and she was as well prepared for a long journey as could be expected for someone to whom the world ended a few miles beyond Contigo.

                When they set out the next day, there was no crowd to say goodbye, but Lynn didn't seem bothered.  Eventually, as they set out to the northeast, Cata snapped.  "Where is everyone?" she blurted, and then withdrew, thinking she should have stayed quiet.  Lynn just laughed.

                "In important situations, the people of Contigo use Mind Read Psynergy to create a sort of mesh between people, allowing us to speak to each other no matter where we are in the village.  Phoveia doesn't want it to be too well known that I'm leaving, but she hasn't forbidden me to tell anyone, either."  She smiled, a little bittersweetly.  "All the friends who might have been here to see me off-" and here she touched her temple "-are in here to say goodbye."

                "'So long' is more like it, unless you're planning to live somewhere else when this is over," said Cata.

                "I don't really know.  Phoveia said that I am meant to follow you, and until I find out why, that I shall do.  But we of the Jupiter Clan are more realistic than hopeful, and there is a certain joy to knowing that 'good bye' was not truly so."

                "Ah.  Precisely who we were missing.  A professional orator and philosopher," said Meg.

                "And healer," Cian added.

                "Flaming good one," the huntress agreed, swivelling her unmarked wrist.

                "You trust Phoveia a lot, then, don't you?" asked Zak.

                "Absolutely.  The most skilled Adept in all of Contigo, a great oracle… and if not for her, my parents would never have met, so in a way I owe her my very life," said Lynn.

                "Well then, I think we should get busy and figure out what you're coming with us for," said Howl.  "I've always wanted to have a Destiny.  This is about as close as I figured I'm likely to get."

                In Contigo, Phoveia was in the sanctum again, again alone except for the other elder, both meditating.  But her thoughts were drawn to the young girl now leaving Contigo, slipping beyond the range even of the meshed minds.

                "You're letting yourself be distracted," he murmured.

                "Perhaps it's just a new focus," Phoveia countered.

                "I should never get into these discussions with you."

                "Probably not."

                "It's not focus," he insisted, still not opening his eyes.  "You're worried."

                "Shouldn't I be?  Isn't she too valuable to lose?"

                "Is her value to us your only concern?" he countered.

                Phoveia struggled to maintain her even breathing and keep from opening her eyes.  "No, of course not.  But you realise that we may be gambling a true disciple of Jupiter-"

                "On the fate of all Weyard," he finished sharply, but then softened.  "Yes, I know.  But we must."

                "If only I believed anything were so simple as 'must'," the elder woman sighed.

                "All right, I have to know," said Lynn at last.  "You're clearly a Lemurian, Cian.  Why didn't you heal Meg when my arrow injured her?  All Lemurians are Mercury Adepts."

                "That's a generalisation, but I suppose the fact that it's true rather steals any possibility to get righteously annoyed," Cian admitted.  They walked on in silence for a few more moments, slowly making their way across a wide green plain, following the Psynergy-trail of the Tomegathericon.  The land rolled as it went, occasionally divided by rivers but mostly a simple expanse of long green grass.

                "Cian?" said Lynn.

                "Yes?" he replied nonchalantly.

                "You ignored my question."

                "Actually, I'd like to know the answer myself," said Meg, elbowing Cian amiably in the ribs.

                "Oh, we know," Elys giggled, looking at Cata and Zak.  "Cian just doesn't like talking about it."

                "They've got me roped too, mate," said Padriac, apologetically.  "Don't make me clap you in irons and do the dripping torture."

                "Pirates don't clap people in irons," Cian pointed out, frowning.

                "We don't _really do the drip thing, either.  It's more of a large cold bucketful around dawn."_

                "All right already!" the Lemurian relented.  "I can't use Ply.  I've tried all my life -and let me tell you, I'm about as old as most of you added together- and just can't do it.  A Mercury Adept who can't heal."  He looked at the others darkly.  "You're supposed to laugh."

                Lynn shrugged and looked to the rest of the Knights.  "I don't see why.  I'm not exactly a master of my own Psynergy either," said Howl.  "See the fur?"

                "Wouldn't make any more sense than laughing at Cata for not being able to use Mind Read," Lynn added.

                "Which I'm quite happy about, thank you.  I have no interest in the inner workings of any of you people or the rest of the population," said Cata, shifting her armor to a more comfortable position.

                "Oh, I don't know," said Lynn innocently, grinning a little.  "When the person being read isn't looking, you can learn some interesting things."  The other Knights instantly spun to face her with varying degrees of vengeance in their expressions.  "Anyway, I don't see why not being able to cast Ply is such a problem," she went on, and scored a few points for avoiding trouble by pretending it wasn't there.

                "What am I supposed to do, then?" asked Cian, a little miserably.

                "Well, how about Aura?  That's a good healing Psynergy," said Lynn, helpfully.

                "That's Mars," Cian said, frowning.

                "I know."

                For a moment the only sound was the wind in the tall grass and the occasional clop of Zak's hooves on stone.

                "Is there something else you know that you're not telling us?" asked Cata.

                Lynn looked confused.  "Well, if he's a Lemurian, then he's got Mercury Psynergy, but he could still back that up with another element, even just for the healing powers," she explained more slowly.

                "Try again," said Elys, but Howl and Meg just looked at each other.  They were both Adepts allied with Djinn of another element, which had the potential to give them unusual powers if their Psynergy grew in strength, but Lynn's Djinni, Gale, was Jupiter, the same as her own alignment.  …An alignment she had mentioned just after unleashing awesome healing energies on Meg, an event that had been rather burned into the minds of both of them (Meg because of her wrist, Howl because the smell of blood had made him lightheaded for hours).

                "Lynn," said Meg, slowly, "are you saying that you've learned Mercury Psynergy _as well as Jupiter, and that's why you're such a good healer?"_

                "Yes," said Lynn, as though she had been trying to explain the idea of math for an hour before someone asked if she meant two came after one.

                "Never heard of double elements," said Cata.

                "Never heard of Jupiter healers," said Elys.

                "Never wanted to go on this quest in the first place," Zak muttered, shaking a bruised hoof tenderly.  He looked up and noticed that everyone was staring at him.  "Just following the pattern."

                "Since _when can Adepts learn _Psynergy_ of more than one _element_?" demanded Padriac._

                "Arr!  It be the perfect chance fer the cap'n here ter fix this whole mess up!  'Till him, every Venus Adept on th' high seas had but one name anyway: 'prepare ter walk the plank'!" said Hail, hopping from nothingness onto Padriac's shoulder.  No one had yet pointed it out to the rather spontaneous Djinni, but she reminded all of them, including landlocked Lynn, of a parrot when she perched there.

                "I've been learning Mercury Psynergy since I was little.  And I have a knack for Lyric, the Jupiter healing Psynergy, so most of my training as a healer was learning how to use both of them together," said Lynn.  "A sort of synergy of Psynergy," she added, grinning.  Everyone else remained blank.  "Never mind."

                "So it doesn't work for everyone?" asked Elys.

                "Oh, no, as far as the elders can tell, it should be possible for anyone to learn Psynergy of a second element.  …I've wondered for a long time why I didn't see more of the Contigans using something besides Jupiter, though.  I wish I had paid more attention to that," she said, a little frustrated.

                "How could you not pay attention to it?  You're like two Adepts in one!  Either tell us how it works or make up your mind!" Howl barked- rather literally.  He wasn't angry, just excited, and there was unfortunately no better word for it.

                "Calm down, boy!" said Cian, waving the lycanthrope into silence.

                "I resent that.  That was a remark intended to wound," he protested.

                "No, it was meant to activate the furry obedient side of you.  Anyway, it's not like you can blame her for not noticing," the Lemurian went on.

                "Why?"

                "I'm working on it, I'm working on it."

                A strange, acrid smell came to them on the breeze at that moment, and a faintly red gust of wind rippled the grass just ahead of Padriac.  In its wake, the blades turned brown and collapsed as though licked by flames.  "Does _anyone_ happen to know _what_ kind of air kills grass _that_ quickly?"

                "Air?" asked Meg, coming forward to check the ravaged swath.

                "It were red," Hail added.

                "Red?  …Not a Poison Flow, surely…" said Lynn.

                "Probably," said Zak.  "I have no idea what a Poison Flow is, but it sounds like our luck."

                Lynn wasn't listening anymore.  She was scanning the sky above them, shielding her eyes from the sun and hoping she wouldn't spot anything.  As Zak had pointed out, though, they weren't that lucky.  A silvery shape broke away from the cloud it had been camouflaged against and dropped toward them, rending the peace with a horrible shrieking roar.

                Straight purple lightning carved a line through the group, scattering Knights on either side and blasting the ground apart where it struck.  "Sky Dragon!" Lynn shouted, and then it was upon them. 


	10. Things Best Left Unread

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Ten: Things Best Left Unread**

                Somehow, Cata had expected something else from a dragon.  This creature was a reptile, and wings, and generally nasty-looking, but its body wasn't too much bigger than Zak, its white scales didn't look too much like a monstrosity of the underworld, and its eyes glowed with something that wasn't quite hellfire.  Heckfire, perhaps.

                The Sky Dragon may have realised that it wasn't all that shocking to look at.  Over the many generations, it had developed a certain understanding of the way prey looked upon it, and some deeply ingrained instinct told it that screaming food tasted better.

                Well, it _is_ a monster.

                Lacking size or a terrible appearance, the dragons had instead put all their effort into a few tricks that could, on occasion, scare food into submission.  It tried one now, leaving a space for a really awful 'shocking' pun by loosing a forked lance of violet lightning from its mouth.  The blast superheated everything it touched, turning a patch of grass into ash and blowing apart the ground underneath.

                As it swept over them again, flattening the grass with the wind of its flight, the dragon gained a great deal more ground toward 'terrifying' with a scream that Cata expected to blast her ears off and set her bones on fire.  Howl and Zak seemed the worst affected, staggering under the sonic assault, but before it could strike at either of them, an arrow whipped across the Sky Dragon's path.  Lynn's shot was deflected by the plates around its neck, but the threat gave the Knights a much-needed moment to recover.

                "You know what this is?" Cata demanded, drawing her Lemurian-crafted sword.  She realised as she did so that this was really the first time it would be tested against anything other than the less-than-amazing weapons wielded by the Alhafran guards.

                "Sky Dragons are the most dangerous creatures on this side of Weyard," Lynn replied.  "Fortunately, they aren't common in the wild, they prefer to live in underground lairs in hard-to-reach places."

                "That's great!" shouted Elys, sarcastically.  "Do the Contigans have any words of wisdom for what to do when they actually _find_ you?"

                "Of course," Lynn shot back, frowning.  "I was out hunting for one when I had the fantastic luck to run into you people."

                The Sky Dragon chose that moment to sweep another Storm Breath through their group.  Padriac failed to dodge this second assault, and was sent sprawling with violet electricity crackling around him.

                "What did you do _wrong_?" asked Zak, bewildered, but when the Sky Dragon circled around toward them again, he kept his focus, slamming a hoof into the ground.  They were already on a slope, and when Zak shouted "_Ridge!_" the earth broke.  The ground tilted until it had opened like a trapdoor in the hill, forming a slanted wall and creating a helpful shelter again the next blast of lightning.

                "It wasn't punishment, it was a privilege!" Lynn insisted.

                "You Contigans must believe in a really great afterlife," said Zak.

                Cian joined them in the lee of Zak's makeshift wall, and he was soon followed by Howl and Meg, supporting Padriac.  Lynn bit her lip at the sight of the shocked captain, and set to work healing him.  The others gathered closer together, wondering how long the protection would be useful.

                "Any ideas?" asked Cata.

                "Oh yes," said Howl, his eyes closed, listening carefully.  "It thinks we've disappeared.  I don't think it quite understands what Zak just did- nice trick, horseboy."

                "Thanks, pup."

                "So what are you-" Cian began, but Howl had heard what he was waiting for and started to move.  He boosted himself up and above Zak, scaling the ridge and leaping up just as the Sky Dragon flew over them, just low enough for his claws to find purchase on its scaly hide.

                The lycanthrope moved quickly, as though gravity were a luxury he had decided to do without for the moment, and bit down as hard as he could on the dragon's neck.  A wolf's jaw muscles were more than a match for the neck of any kind of prey in the world, but Sky Dragons aren't prey after the age of approximately three hours.

                "Ouch!" Howl yelped, recoiling from the iron-hard neck scales he had just tried to bite through.  There were a few moments of frenzied growling, interspersed with yips and a few truly vicious human curses, all muffled by Howl's hand holding his injured mouth.  The Sky Dragon rolled and Howl dropped, but his fall was cushioned by Cian's arms.  "It works on everything else," he insisted, standing up.

                "I have this great idea," said Zephyr, brightly.

                "What?" asked Cata.

                "_Use the Djinn for once in your lives!_" the Jupiter Djinni screamed.

                Cata and Meg looked at each other.  "Y'know, she could be right," said Cata.

                "I'm inclined to agree," said Meg.

                "Sure," said Elys.  "Just _get_ met one!"

                "Sky Dragon," said Cata, thoughtfully, ignoring her friend's continuing protests.

                "Jupiter aligned for sure.  Especially out here, with the Jupiter Clan," Cian decided.

                "So we hit it with Venus Psynergy?" said Meg.

                "Hit it with whatever you can, I think, but Venus is going to be what wins this one," said Cata.  The dragon was still wary after being ambushed last time, but was daring to come at them again now, this time from the unprotected side.

                Meg and Cian dashed ahead to meet it, expecting it to fly low again, but it had decided that the strange furry thing probably couldn't jump fifty feet, and so soared up out of reach.  Elys fired Prism Psynergy at it in a high arc, but the giant ice block fell quite short 

                "_Planet Diver!_" Meg shouted, jumping an incredible height like a meteorite in reverse, glowing red with an aura of Mars Psynergy.  The Sky Dragon was losing height quickly in its efforts to hold steady, and Meg just managed to reach it at the top of her arc.  The two crashed back down to the ground and burst apart, sending bright sparks up in a cloud.

                "It's about time I did _something_," Cian muttered to himself, and charged the dragon before it could take flight again.  His sabre danced across its scales like a bladed rainstorm, chipping relentlessly, but could never seem to pierce them.  The dragon flapped twice, lifting off.  "_Froth!_"  A volley of watery globes burst from Cian's hand, and they struck like exploding whirlpools.

                The Sky Dragon wasn't hurt by his blast, but the sheer force did send it tumbling back down to the ground, this time ready for battle and so angry at the pesky blue-haired one that it forgot all about that nasty furry thing.  The nasty furry thing, who preferred 'Howl', or even 'aiee, get it away', hadn't forgotten about him, but an unthinking swing of the dragon's tail sent him rolling in the dust.

                "I'd really enjoy some backup!" Cian called, now forced onto the defensive.  The Sky Dragon's claws had already ripped at his Lemurian adventuring clothes, but the fencing style that was common on that island was made for simultaneous attack and defence, so he hadn't been badly cut into yet.

                "I'm here already," said Meg, and a flaming sword stabbed out over his shoulder, scorching the Sky Dragon's reaching claw.  "That Planet Diver wasn't my most brilliant work."

                Now facing two options for a snack, the Sky Dragon was torn between going for the easier one and leaving the rest alone, or trying for the nasty fire-toothed one.  If it succeeded in killing her, then all the rest would be much easier, especially the horse that wasn't daring to come near.

                It bashed Cian to the side with a wing and moved to savage Meg.  Elys had other ideas.

                "_Ice Horn!_"  Her Psynergy struck the Sky Dragon from the side, chilling it and finding the occasional gap between damaged scales.  The dragon screeched again, turning to blast Elys into oblivion, spreading its wings wide- and suddenly the idea of 'tricked' entered its predatory mind.

                After a few minutes of Lynn's considerable powers of treatment, Padriac had decided that his preferred combat tactic -'if it moves, hit it again'- lacked the sort of impression he needed to make.  He intended to make an impression right through those scales and out the other side.

                "_Stone Justice!_"  The ground around him shattered and rose, spinning in the air.  Padriac raised his arm toward the dragon, pointed, and his rock storm lashed its vulnerable underside and wings.  Scales were chipped and broken, but the Venus Psynergy wasn't as devastating as he had expected.

                "Oh, honestly!" said Lynn, exasperated.  She had just finished fixing Padriac up under Zak's shelter to watch him go and put himself into another perilous position.  Lynn hated to see good work get injured again, and killed was right out of the question.  "Sky Dragons resist Venus power, they're weak to Jupiter!  _Unleash Gale!_"  

                At the healer's call, Gale flew into being and released a powerful windstream that was luminous with purple-glowing Psynergy.  Her attack smashed into the dragon, sending it into a tumbling, bouncing fall before the air currents converged and the dragon vanished in a swirl of grey.

                There was a moment's wonderment at Gale's display of power before the Djinn started in on the Knights, too.  The humans (and horse, and part-humans) were breathing hard, but Djinn don't breathe, which frees up a lot of their time for nagging.

                "Weak to Jupiter?" demanded Squall.  "Meg, you and I could have taken that thing!"

                "I told you," said Zephyr, shaking her head at Cata.  "Use the Djinn. But no, you have to do things the hard way."

                "Let's not let them get any further ahead!  The Tomegathericon is still to the northwest!" said Spring, carefully tuning his Psynergy-sense to the unique rhythm of the dark book.

                Cata looked at Elys, disbelief at the Djinn on both their faces.  "You know, not having a Djinni isn't necessarily a bad thing," said Cata.

                When they finally saw Tolbi, City of Invention, appear on the horizon, most of the Knights were about ready to collapse on the spot.  The only ones who hadn't noticed the passing miles were Zak, Howl, and Meg, which Cian decided probably had to do with none of them quite being human.

                "What are you smirking about?" asked Meg, half frowning.

                "Oh, nothing," the Lemurian replied.

                "Do we really have to walk the rest of the way there tonight?" asked Elys.  "I'm beat."

                "It's that or wait out here to see how far Sky Dragon territory reaches," Meg pointed out.

                "Come on, no time to lose!" said Zak.  "Elys, hop up.  Or hold still, I'll do another earth-shifting thing so you can just fall over my back.  Whatever, let's just get inside some _walls_!"

                "What do you think?" Howl asked Cata, who was, he supposed, technically the leader.

                "I think we should probably listen to Zak or risk losing most of our carrying capacity.  And do you really want to have to carry your own provisions?" she asked him.  It was meant to be rhetorical, but then, she was talking to a werewolf.

                "Well, actually, I find they usually carry themselves until they're needed, though it can be difficult to find them when they're… needed…"  Howl noticed that he had suddenly become the centre of attention, in as much as blank stares and the occasional open jaw can be called 'attention'.  He was guessing, however, in the case of Zak, who was about halfway to Tolbi and accelerating, with Elys on his back.

                Eventually the Knights caught up at the edges of the city, just as the sun vanished under the horizon.  Zak insisted on an inn with a thick-walled stable that had stone foundations, which was fortunately not too expensive for the human (or mostly human) members of the party.  Padriac insisted on trying to get into a fight in the pub on the main floor, but after pulling him off the sixth man to 'deliberately provoke me by saying he didn't want to fight', Cian locked him in his room.

                When they woke the next morning, Tolbi had changed.  Instead of a city, Cata opened the inn's door to encounter chaos with buildings in.  She shut it again quickly.  "I think someone heard about Howl," she told the others, looking like she was holding back a flood.

                The others all turned their gazes on the lycanthrope, who had his hood pulled low.  "Well, I _was_ on the roof last night, but it's not like I was… howling… or stealing chickens again or something."

                This didn't change much in the way his companions were watching him.

                "Oh, come on, it's true," said Meg, annoyed.  "I was up there with him.  I'm still not really used to staying up all day and sleeping at night."

                "And that's the _only_ reason, is it?"

                "Cian, don't make me feed you your boots."

                "Ye're blockin' the door, lass!  Get outta my way or I'll have te be breakin' the wall, an' innkeepers can get mighty pushy about payin' fer repairs!"  The Adepts turned to see where this rumbling was coming from, and eventually found its source slightly closer to the ground than they expected.

                "Who's the short guy?" Elys whispered to Cian.

                "Actually, he's relatively tall.  That's a dwarf," Cian replied, trying as hard as possible to look like he wasn't talking.  Dwarves, however, have inhuman hearing (what else do you expect from nonhumans?) when it comes to people talking about their height.  This one, who either had thick brown hair or a badger strapped to his head -which was admittedly just under four feet off the ground- gave them a glare to rust iron.

                "A dwarf," he repeated.  "That's true enough.  An' I notice the lot o' ye are humans, but ye dinnae see me hangin around here an' saying-" and suddenly the dwarf's voice became the pinnacle of refined human noble twit-ness "my goodness me, what a positive gaggle of tall fellows.  I say, that one has blue hair."

                "Well, I am Lemurian.  I suppose that still counts as human, but it's a sort of… different…"  Cian decided, after seeing the looks he was now getting from the dwarf _and_ all his friends, that this would be a good time to stop trying to help.

                "Also, I'm not-" Howl began, but Meg silenced him with indifferent efficiency.

                "Sorry," said Cata, "it's just that Elys and I have never met a dwarf before."

                "Really?" asked Padriac, who glared at the dwarf every few moments.  "Well let me _tell_ you about them, then.  They're a particular _type_ of blustering hard-headed _miners_ who couldn't care less about _anything_ that isn't rocks, make positively _awful_ conversationalists, and have the general personability of a _pirate_."

                The Knights took faster stock of the situation than a compulsive quartermaster-savant and dove to the sides, though Cata suspected Meg could have been fast enough to boil some water on the now flame-red dwarf before he let loose a famous dwarven war cry ("_AHHHRGH!_", which translates roughly to 'ahrgh') and body-checked Padriac.

                However, the captain was the only one who hadn't moved, and he took the flying tackle with ease.  The next few minutes were mostly made up of thumping, shouting, and the occasional cough as a particularly solid blow met its target.  The best thing you could say about them was that it was the most civilised brawl of all time, with no furniture broken, and at one point Elys could have sworn the dwarf sidestepped to keep from dropping Padriac onto an ornate side table.

                "Hah!" Padriac laughed at last, dropping into a sitting position against the wall.  "_No_ one fights like a dwarf.  'S been _far_ too long since I sparred with one of _your_ people."

                "Ye're a fair walloper yerself!" the dwarf admitted, dropping (a rather shorter distance) beside him.  "And a hard headed one, too!" he added, rubbing his forehead.

                "Father's side," Padriac explained, in his over-exaggerated, slightly slurred way.  Cata was starting to notice that he slipped to this one, the more piratical, from his usual refined captain-speech when he was feeling relaxed.  "In fact," he went on, screwing up his brow in thought, "I think one of my great-great grandmothers might've been a dwarf."

                "Really?" said the dwarf.  They looked each other, noting the difference in heights.

                "_Great_-great-great," Padriac amended.  He noticed, looking rather owlish (or so they say, though Cata never really understood why 'owlish' described someone who was looking at something nearby as though it were a mile off) that the other Knights were still mostly keeping their distance.  "Come on, then," he called, standing up.

                "What are the chances of my being used as a blunt instrument if I show my face?" asked Lynn.

                "Low," said Padriac.  "Dagna is as fine a _dwarf_ as I've yet met, and _not_ going to bite."

                "Not without fair warnin'," the dwarf, whose name was apparently Dagna, added, and Padriac nodded in serious agreement.

                "Well… good, then," said Cata, slowly.  "I'm Cata."  The others gave their names, and Howl was quite surprised when Dagna sniffed slightly as the lycanthrope spoke (taking care to keep his hood up) and then muttered about the places wolfmen got themselves into these days.

                "An' ye've left a few out, I can tell," Dagna rumbled.  "Well, I'll be the first ter start, since 'm not the type ter ask others te do what I wouldna do meself.  This's Geode, an' he's been me friend since before the lot o' yer were born.  …Maybe not yon blue-haired fellow."  As Dagna spoke, spring-green lights resolved into the shape of a brown creature that had to be a Djinni, and Venus-aligned at that.

                "Geode!" shouted a voice.  

                The Venus Djinni closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them in horror.  "I know that one…"  The inn's front door swung open after a bit of Zak's convincing, and a Mars Djinni bounded inside gleefully.  "Oh no… Coal…"

                "Geode!  I haven't seen you in ages!  How've you been?" asked Coal.

                "Suspiciously well, until very recently.  I should have expected this," Geode muttered.

                "What, did you catch a cold?"

                Geode eyed the Djinni, who looked like a fire with eyes and feet.  "Quite the opposite, actually."

                "What, a fever?  Hey, Fever's here too, didja know?"

                "Fever?"  At this, Geode actually sounded less like he had been sentenced to a life aboveground.  Slowly the Djinni scanned the room, stopping on each of the Knights in turn.  "Hey, you _all_ have Djinn.  Well, except for her."

                "Don't remind me," Elys said, a bit bitterly.

                "Two Jupiter, two Mars, two Mercury… somehow I'm not surprised," said Geode.

                "A' right, a' right, are ye gonna be getting' out o' me way 'r what?" asked Dagna, waving for the Knights to get away from the door.  "That Card's me own, an' I'm not thinking fer lettin' anybody else get their hands on what's belonging to meself!"

                "Uh… Padriac, do you think you could manage to finesse out of him what the devil he's ranting about?" asked Cata, quietly.

                Dwarves have excellent hearing.  "'M rantin' about Colosso, lass, an' ye're in me way, meanin' I'm not setting up me contrapumulation, meanin' I'm not entered in yon contest, meanin' _someone else is gonna get me Mysterious Card!_"  At this, Dagna took off toward the wall, with the apparent intent of muscling his way through, and it was clear that granite would have been persuaded to let him through.  Elys jumped away from the door, and with a nudge from Howl's powerful arm, the door was merely smashed open at half the speed of light, rather than the wall being destroyed.

                "Colosso," said Cian, as though ballistic dwarves weren't even worth noting.  "I remember hearing about it when I was in Tolbi one time.  I've never seen it, but apparently it's some kind of inventor's tournament."

                "Great, great, but we can't stay," said Elys.  "The Tomegathericon's nearby, we have to keep moving."

                "Actually…" Spring admitted as he appeared on Cian's head, "I'm sort of… lost."

                "What do you mean?  We're in Tolbi.  Everyone knows Tolbi, don't they?" asked Lynn.

                "Uh… no?" suggested Elys.

                "I know where I am," Spring went on irritably.  "I just don't know where everything else is.  Can't you feel the turmoil?  There have to be hundreds of Adepts in this city, and of all the alignments… I can't place Hail, let alone something as powerfully chaotic as the Tomegathericon."

                "Hundreds of Adepts," Howl repeated, thoughtfully.

                "It _could_ just be me…" Padriac began.

                "But this place sounds like the perfect hiding spot for a couple of Venus Adepts who don't want to be noticed," the lycanthrope finished.  "Even someone in shadow mail like Dullahan."

                "Even people who've never heard of Tolbi know who Dullahan is," Meg insisted.  "_I_ know who Dullahan is.  Or maybe 'are'.  There's more than one, right?"  
                "There's a Dullahan for every generation.  When the old one is too old, or weakened, he finds a new person to wear the armor.  Who knows what their purpose is.  But there's always a Dullahan," said Lynn.  "They say one of them battled with the people of Anemos in ancient times."

                "And got royally smoten," Gale added in a satisfied tone.

                "The monarch fought him?" Howl suggested.

                "The smiting happened after a few dozen of the finest Jupiter Adepts had been killed in battle, of course," Lynn pointed out, wisely suspecting that smug Djinn could only be worse than the normal kind.

                "All right, if we know they're hiding in Tolbi somewhere, and all the Adepts are probably gathering for Colosso, then let's get looking!" Cata declared.  "Where's my sword?"

                "This is madness."

                "It is our only chance."

                "I didn't say it wasn't."

                "Dullahan, you're a waste of plate mail."

                "The fact that I didn't say it wasn't doesn't mean I don't think it isn't."

                "Try to confuse me all you want.  Unfortunately, I'm brighter than you.  Bright enough to know that there's more than one way to harness unholy power."

                "What, you study this in your spare time?"

                "I'm just creative."

                "Well, that's more likely than Lemuria's libraries containing anything like _Ungodly Power and You: Controlling the Awesome Destructive Forces of the Damned._"

                "Very funny.  Just… drop something heavy on it and run if this goes wrong."

                "If it goes wrong, he's not going to be happy."

                "If it goes wrong, we'll be dead.  No fear of torture."

                "I'm more enthusiastic already."

                Some miles to the south, Rish was certain she had lost the trail of whoever those Druj had been protecting.  They had been hard to follow to begin with, and while the other Adepts had been easier to follow, they had entered Contigo, and she was not fool enough to enter that place uninvited.

                "This is hopeless," she stated aloud.

                "You know what I think when you say that," one of her companions stated reproachfully.

                "Yes, yes.  But then, you don't have the same concerns I do.  Nor the same perspective."

                "Not much we can do about the second part," her other friend remarked, just loudly enough to be heard.  "You're about six times his height."

                "I _do_, however, have more experience, and I've never seen anything good come of losing all hope," said the first, pointedly ignoring any other comments.

                "You can be so difficult, Sera-" Rish began, and then a sensation rolled across her mind like a liquid shockwave.  "North!"

                "Tolbi.  Should have guessed."

                "Don't bother with guessing!  We might not have much time!"

                Colosso was a riot.  The stands were full with onlookers, nearly all of whom were Adepts, and in the middle of the vast ring of seats, there was a sea of people that only broke to allow space for a variety of devices that could have been created by tying a windmill to a giant's two-in-one garlic crusher / pasta friller and half-melting a few of the less interesting bits.

                "This could be slightly harder than we expected," Cian admitted.

                "No one bothered asking me," Zak grumbled.

                "They never ask us helpful types," Coal agreed, glaring at the others from his place on Zak's head.

                "Oh, get out of sight!  We don't want to get mobbed!" Lynn told the Djinni, waving him away.

                "_No_ one even _remotely_ sane would mob a _Mars_ Djinni," Padriac remarked.

                "These are Adepts.  Creative ones, too, considering these thing's they've built," the Jupiter healer explained as they passed something that had mostly been covered with netting.  "Any Djinni, even a psychotic one, would draw more attention than we want if we're trying to find Jastyx and Dullahan."

                "Saying their names probably isn't a great idea either," Cian remarked.

                "Very well.  Where shall we begin our search for these particular August Personages, good sir?"  asked Elys.  Cian sighed deeply and started examining a large pulley that appeared to start with the bungee-jumping principal, upside down.

                "Ye didnae tell me ye'd be here too!  I hope fer yer own sake that ye're no' in the competition!" Dagna rumbled, parting the crowd by sheer stubbornness and approaching the Knights.  "C'm'ere, ye've got ter see the winnin' device before any o' this lot get their hands on it."

                Following Dagna, since there seemed no other way out, they found themselves in front of a massive structure of wooden beams and more gears than anything except possibly an Elemental Spirit's watch could possibly need.  "And this does what?"

                "Mostly it's supposed ter trip up yon testers.  The ruler o' Tolbi picks a few Champions every year ter decide which one o' the inventors wins the prize.  All we 'ave ter think about is the best ways o' buildin' a sort o' obstacle course that e'en a Champion cannae get across.  There're teams, too, but I'm more of a virtuoso constructor."

                "And destructor," Padriac remarked.  "Are those powder charges?"

                "Aye, aye.  Ye see, yer twit Champion comes up there, has ter roll across the water on logs while avoidin' the fallin' sodium bags, and if 'e hasnae pulled the right sequence o' chains on the trip over, or if 'e steps with the left foot instead o' the right foot on the platform, or if 'e hits one 'o the fake steps -ye'll notice the fake steps on yon staircase switch every couple o' seconds, the clockwork fer that took _weeks_- then the charges go off an we're all really happy that there's lots o' water in the pool."

                "Jupiter preserve me from the creative people," Cata remarked.

                Meg dropped down from somewhere in the machinery.  "Not bad," she decided.  "But that clockwork's a bit rusty.  I had to practically stomp on one of those steps before it gave way."

                "Ye did what?" asked Dagna, bewildered.

                "Oh, that's just Meg.  She's about as far from normal as you can get."

                "Uh… Howl?"

                "Yes?"

                "…Never mind."

                Jastyx placed the Tomegathericon on the ground reverently.  At least, it looked like reverently, but was suspiciously similar to 'rigid with terror'.  "We're clear on this, right?" she asked.

                "Yes, yes."

                "I do this, you just kill anyone who tries to stop us."

                "I've got it."

                "And you don't look at any of the pages."

                "No."

                "Nor any words."

                "I've got the idea."

                "Not even a 'single glance at a syllable or two that couldn't possibly hurt'."

                "Mm-hmm."

                "The illustrations are even _less_ safe, if that's possible."

                "Can you get on with it?"

                "Blindfold yourself first."

                "I thought I was guarding you."

                "I thought you were a _warrior_."

                "That's low."  Dullahan sighed, forced to back down to prove his skill, and tied a bolt of violet-grey silk around his eyes.  Jastyx closed hers, trusting common sense to keep those lids shut, and opened the black book to a random page.

                "We are in danger," the Venus Adept intoned.  "We are trapped, and we carry you to one who will bring forth your power as it has never been seen before.  We are not capable of channelling you, but we have need of that same power.  Help us, that we might aid you."

                Through her closed eyes Jastyx saw the glow, and wheezing, scratching words flowed from the pages.  It was like listening to an entire chorus speak a sentence in a second by having each person recite a different word.  The Tomegathericon might have said "_I do not aid, but I shall bring to you beneficent destruction._"

                "I suppose that'll have to do," she muttered.  The pages were flipping back and forth on their own, and a strange humming was growing in her ears.

                "Better than being incinerated," Dullahan said, staring blindly at the world, but now very thankful for the blindfold.

                "We can only hope," she replied.  His grip on his sword tightened rather a lot.

                "So, once these Champions get blown to Contigo, the prize'll be mine, an' this year I've heard it's a Mysterious Card.  Nae a soul left in the world knows where those came from, and there are nae many left," said Dagna.  Cata suspected that he could have kept talking for hours, but she had been left behind somewhere around the idea of sodium bags, and so was almost grateful for what happened next.

                The key word there is definitely 'almost'.


	11. Once and Never Again

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Eleven:  Once and Never Again**

                Cata was sceptically looking over Dagna's device.  The sodium, she had been told, was a type of mineral that burst into flames on contact with water.  Her views on this could best be described as mixed.  On the one hand, it seemed sort of right that _something_ didn't just get damp when soaked, or else the world would be too boring.  On the other hand, she was also making a note never to swim after eating salty food.

                "That sodium are just what I've been needin' these past years, somethin' that nae a one o' the competition's ever thought ter use, somethin' that requires a real creative mind -'ere, hold this bit fer me while I tighten the screws 'r the crowd's goin' ter be feelin' a refreshing breeze in bits that shouldna see daylight about thirty seconds after I flip yon switch- an' ye'll see that no' a one has got e'en half as complicated a design as meself-"

                Her thoughtful mood, already under assault by a talkative dwarf who was clambering around in a maze of axles and wheels all designed to do some really unpleasant things to people who were off their guard, was obliterated like an icicle in a fire dragon's mouth.

                It was afterwards that Cata understood the significance of what happened.  A great block of granite struck the ground beside her, digging in deeply and spraying dirt in all directions, and _then_ the shockwave rolled over them from the blast that had just torn through the palace wall.  Where a strong granite face had once extended the ruler's palace into the coliseum, there was smoke, fire, and a serious absence of stone.

                That was because it had been blown apart, some of it at supersonic speeds, and was now digging into the crowd like a meteor shower that hadn't bothered to burn up in the atmosphere.  Things would have been bad, except that most of the gathered spectators and competitors were Adepts.  As it was, they started off well and then went _very_ bad.

                The first few seconds were pure chaos, and with so many people gathered, it was inevitable that many of them were struck by wreckage, but most every Mars Adept in the blast radius had soon shouted "_Protect!_" or whatever version of that Psynergy they had available.  The rest of the debris that fell ended up being deflected off a dozen overlapping Psynergy shields until it crashed down at the very edges of the crowd.

                "What do you suppose are the chances that the crowd's going to be rational about this and leave us behind?" asked Cian.

                "You want to stay here?!" Howl blurted.  "Did you get clipped by one of those rocks?"

                "This is obviously Jastyx and Dullahan's work," Cian countered.

                "Obviously," Meg agreed, but didn't get the chance to see if anyone noticed her ironic tone.  A line of flames rolled across the ground like a trickling stream, splitting the group and slithering on into the crowd, leaving a firewall in its path.

                "Something's strange about this," said Elys, slowly. 

                Cata took a breath, trying to gather as much sarcasm as possible before unleashing it on her friend and getting down to work, but Lynn cut her off.  "You don't mean the obvious stuff, do you?" asked the Jupiter healer.  "Something more subtle?"

                Elys nodded.  "And it's got to do with that fire."

                "Well, I've never seen fire flow before," Cata admitted.  "But hey, Psynergy is Psynergy."

                "Jastyx and Dullahan are both Venus Adepts," Zak pointed out, wishing he hadn't.

                "…Okay, I'm starting to see your point.  So what?"

                "Also, stone doesn't burn," said Lynn.

                "Can I ask 'so what' again?" Cata inquired.

                "Well… that fire's getting bigger," Lynn explained, pointing to the blazing palace walls.

                "Why aren't these people leaving?  There's been an explosion and there's a rush to get closer?"

                "Meg, these are Adepts," said Cian.  "A lot of them are just as… _nearly_ as stubborn as you.  Even the inventors."

                "_On_ that particular topic, _where's_ our dwarvish friend?" asked Padriac.

                "Probably in the chaos, looking for someone to be affronted by.  Dwarves can get into the spirit of disasters, but they just don't have the same perspectives," Cian remarked, leading the way through the crowd, hoping more for a bit of clear space than to find Dagna.

                "We're never going to find them in this sort of mayhem," Meg stated, angrily.

                "That's their idea, I think.  So we have to see that it doesn't work.  What's the best thing to do when you've got a covering distraction?" asked the Lemurian.

                "Escape?" Howl suggested.  "I've had some good escapes."

                "No," Padriac realised.  "No, the _dangerous_ thing is escape.  The _tricky_ one, type of thing you get with your _real_ pirate types, is to stay _right_ where you are when everyone _expects_ you to escape."

                "You think this is like those Psynergy auras she could see in Contigo?" asked Cata, a few steps away from Elys.  It wasn't hard to slip aside; Elys seemed to be half in another world at the moment.

                "Exactly like that.  Only not."

                "…When I do create an entrance test for the Knights of Alchemy, you're going to take it every morning for a month."

                "I'm doing my best, but I don't really understand either.  Elys has gifts with Psynergy that no one her age should even know about, that much is clear.  If she says there's something weird about the fire, I believe it."

                "What do we do?"

                "Look out," Elys stated conversationally.  Lynn grabbed Cata by the arm and dropped to the ground as a gout of flames burst out of the still-raging fire and over their heads.

                "I believe it too," Cata decided, feeling rather singed.

                "It's not really working…" Dullahan said, doing his best not to sound worried.

                "We need more," Jastyx told the Tomegathericon.

                Its pages flipped and released another blast of wheezing words all at once, that constructed themselves in Jastyx's mind as "_You need more?  You do not demand of me!_"

                "We ask only in your interest!" Jastyx insisted hurriedly.  If the Tomegathericon wanted them dead, she was all too certain they would never even find out.

                It was silent for a long time.  Then another salvo of words: "_So be it.  You shall have more._"

                The lines of fire that had been looping through the crowd turned as one and raced back into the flames and stone.  When they connected, in the centre of the blaze, another shockwave rolled out, though there had been no explosion.  This one had an attitude, as well- it pushed every Adept in the crowd backwards as solidly as an expanding wall, until a circle of a hundred feet was bare to the ground around the broken palace.

                The smoke had been billowing up and out into a vast black pillar, but it sucked back together now, condensing into a shape as though filling a mold.  When it was as opaque and black as it could get, the shape took a step forward, and a great beast shook the ash from its hide.

                A round of swearing rolled through some of the crowd like a profane choir, but the few historically well-read Adepts were beyond words.  Howl was in neither group.

                "What the hell's that?" he demanded.

                "Chimaera," Cian gasped eventually.

                "Oh.  That's not so bad.  I've heard of chimeras."

                "No.  Chim_a_era.  It's important."

                "How?"

                "Chimeras are a seriously diluted and cut-down version of an ancient and original monstrosity of darkness and flames."

                "And chimaeras?"

                "You have to ask?"

                "I was hopeful."

                It could have been worse, though, and because the Tomegathericon is not the type of literature to assert something without evidence, it went on to prove how _much_ worse.  The smoke was now gone completely, was not even rising from the flames, but those flames weren't done, either.  They lifted off the ground and swirled together into a single point that rivalled the sun for brightness.

                The biggest difference was that if the sun ever exploded, it probably wouldn't form wings and shape itself into a phoenix.

                "That is _so_-" Elys began, and then collapsed.

                "At least that simplifies things," said Cata, while Lynn checked to make sure Elys hadn't twisted anything in the fall.

                "Yes.  Or complicates them.  Maybe both."

                "You're doing it again…" Cata stated in a warning tone.

                "You do realise you're ignoring a pair of giant fire monsters?"

                "How the hell do I fight those?!" the girl burst out.  "Swords melt, and I sure can't call up enough wind to blow them out, what do I do?!"

                The chimaera seemed to have cleared its head of the first dizzying moments of creation, and so leapt out into the crowd, chasing the fleeing Adepts like a demoncat after mice.  The eagle head let out a shriek of wrath and hatred.  The goat head… well, admittedly, just sort of hung there and tried to look menacing.  Goats can only do so much at a time.

                "_Drench!_" came the shout, and several others along those lines, as the Mercury Adepts in the throng lashed back at the great beast, but it took no notice except to hiss and spew out a Dark Blessing.  Black fog rolled over a swath of Adepts and dropped them to the ground, weakened into unconsciousness.

                "All right!" Cian shouted, and he had just the right voice for it, "everyone get out of the coliseum and block the exits!  We aren't going to solve this problem as a formless mob!"

                A few voices of derision sniped at Cian, but they were quickly silenced by most of the others in the crowd, who had a deep respect for Lemurians.  "Are you blind?  Blue hair means do what you're told!"  

                "Is there something about you I'm just not getting?" asked Meg.

                "Could be," Cian agreed, slightly embarrassed about being seen 'taking charge'.

                "Whatever, as long as I'm not tripping over prone Adepts anymore," said Howl.  "Of course, now I'm going to be locked inside a big ring-shaped building with a beast composed of smoke and fury."

                Meg had drawn her swords and was debating whether setting them aflame would be any help when she noticed Howl was right.  The fallen Adepts were being picked up and carried along with the rest of the tide without a word of complaint.  Maybe cities weren't always so bad after all.

                "What's the plan, then?" she asked.  Cian had just fired Froth Psynergy at the chimaera, which didn't harm it, but at least drew its attention away from the fleeing crowd.

                "Try to defeat those things and avoid dying," he replied.

                "So in _fact_ your plan is to rush into battle while you _think_ of a plan, am I right?" asked Padriac.

                "I was hoping someone else would be doing the other part of the planning, but yes."

                "You're the old adventurer, haven't you ever slain one of these before?" Meg demanded.  The chimaera had been stomping toward them purposefully, and was getting close enough for them to feel the heat it projected, but running wouldn't do any good either.

                "I might have if they weren't supposed to have been extinct for a millennium and a half," Cian replied.

                "_And_ a half?  How specif-"  The rest of Meg's comment was cut off, as she leapt aside from a fireball launched by the lion-head.

                "_Spire!_"  Padriac hurled a large stalactite at the beat, and wasn't particularly surprised when the eagle head blasted it apart with superheating lightning.  "Hmm.  I suppose _you_ think being indecisive about _what_ the hell you are gives you the _right_ to multiple elements?  _Briar!_"  A gout of flames incinerated the plants.  "_Earthquake!_"  The chimaera avoided the shifting earth altogether with a few flaps of its wings.

                "It's playing with him," Meg stated grimly.

                "He's playing with it," Cian added.  They were both right.  The chimaera countered or avoided everything Padriac could throw at it, but the captain was grinning widely, and wasn't losing his enthusiasm, either.  "Pirates live on adventure, and nothing stops them but death.  And even then watch your back."

                "Lemurian saying?"

                "How did you know?"

                "…Neither of us is helping."

                "Only a problem if there's any way we _could_ help.  Right now, no one's getting hurt, either."

                "_Hi!  Remember us?!_"  Cian and Meg whirled to see Cata, split from them by a still-crackling firewall.  Elys was down, Lynn was kneeling beside her in best healer fashion, and Zak was trying to find an escape route.

                And then there was the phoenix.

                It dove about them, screaming like any other bird of prey, if twenty times bigger and flaming furiously, and the only reason Zak was alive to be terrified, instead of being a large meal was that Cata had fended off every swoop with her blade.

                "You help Padriac, I'll help them," Cian decided immediately.  "Because water will do more good than fire," he explained, before Meg could even ask.

                This wasn't quite as true as he hoped.  Drench wasn't bad as water Psynergies went, but the firewall didn't even bother to flicker, and Mad Froth flew uselessly past the swift bird.  Cursing the Tomegathericon twice as much as it already was, Cian ran to look for anything else that might be useful in the forest of inventions that filled the coliseum.

                "_Wild Growth!_" Padriac cried, and watched his attack burn with an ever-increasing grin.  The combatants were into a pattern of attack and defence now, and could predict each others' moves quite well.  The chimaera knew what he'd do the same time he decided.

                Padriac did so love underhanded tricks.  "_Unleash Hail!_"

                "It's about time, ye blackhearted plunderer!" Hail shouted as she leapt forth, hurling a tide of ice and freezing water at the chimaera.

                "Just _beat_ that thing and _leave_ the pirate talk to _me_, savvy?" Padriac commanded.  The Djinni and Adept watched as their enemy struggled to escape the frozen mass that had formed around it.  "Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, doesn't it?"

                Meg whirled in from the side, a spiral of steely doom.  She hacked through the ice layer and began a frenzied assault that might have finished the chimaera off, except that either by reflex or a moment's oversight, she set both blades ablaze.

                The moment a flaming edge touched the chimaera, it turned too bright to look at.  The incandescence turned Hail's ice cage into a veil of steam, and by the time either of the fighters could see a thing, it was free, angry, and about twice the size it had been.

                "_You_ just love to _help_, don't you?" asked Padriac.  He made it sound like 'you just love to grease our weapons before we head into battle, don't you?'

                "Oh, bloody-" Meg began before the chimaera's powerful claw sent her sprawling into the oblivion of unconsciousness.

                "This has stopped going to plan," Padriac muttered, advancing on the chimaera, more warily than before.  "This would be an excellent time for you to explain how we're going to save her."

                "Arr…" Hail grumbled.  "Accordin' ter all the usual rules an' suchlike this are not somethin' I should be telling ter yerself, but the Spirits know I'm a pirate, an' pirates don't much care fer the rules."  She brightened a bit.  "Which is meanin' they must 'ave known all along I'd choose ter tell ye."

                "Are you going anywhere with this?" Padriac asked, taking his eyes off the chimaera to glare at his Djinni.  Hail looked back, and gave him a truly piratical grin.

                While he didn't like the idea much, Cian thought he had finally found a way over the firewall.  A quick double-casting of Froth and Frost froze him a pillar of ice, and after a slippery moment or two, worrying all along that the phoenix would notice and turn him into an elegant Lemurian entrée.

                "If this is where it ends, that spring water's not all it's cracked up to be…" he murmured, and leapt over the flames.  He narrowly missed being sliced by Cata, who thought the phoenix had managed to swoop around behind her, and hit the ground rolling with only a slight toasted-leather smell coming from his boots.

                "How's she doing?" he asked Lynn, who was looking far more singed and shaken than he was.

                "Bizarre.  It's… there's no good reason for her to be down.  She's not injured in the slightest."

                "Well, I suppose Spring could try to help.  There aren't many injuries he can't handle."

                Being one of the few people on Weyard who could speak from experience, Cata had decided that she preferred fighting a dragon to fending off a phoenix.  The creature truly was fire in the shape of a bird, and so while her mythril sword hadn't even been warmed up much, even a perfectly aimed swing through its wing left no mark.

                "That's it…" she growled.  "There's something weird about your eyes, so that's where you get it next."  The phoenix turned its circling path on its side, looping down to slash at Cata with talons that were very good at cutting (for lines of yellow fire).  Cata readied herself, not wanting to dodge until the last moment, to keep the phoenix on a vulnerable course-

                "_Sckeer__!_"

                "What in the-"

                There was a moment's confused tangle, and then the firebird lifted up again, this time with her sword in its grip.  The phoenix dropped Cata's weapon outside the firewall and then dove back, driving the knight to the ground.

                "_Unleash Spring!_" Cian declared.  Spring answered the call, hovering over Elys and letting blue twinkles of Mercury Psynergy flow down into her.

                Instantly the girl jolted up, so awake and tense that you'd think she had just tripped in the middle of battle.  "That's it!" she said, and didn't seem at all worried that neither of her healers had the slightest clue what she was talking about.

                "Fine, if the sword's such a problem," Cata muttered to herself, watching the phoenix as it chose the course of its next diving attack, "we'll see if lightning makes an impression."  Jupiter Psynergy for a Storm Ray attack began to gather around her hands, and as the phoenix dove, Cata raised her arms to cast.

                "No!" Elys yelped, pushing Cata aside.  She reached out, called the electric power from Cata's hand, and released it into the bare ground nearby.  Another shove from Elys sent her friend staggering away, and then the phoenix was on her.

                "Elys!" Cian shouted, but before he had taken a second step, he knew he couldn't do anything.  The phoenixfire had engulfed her.

                Strangely, Elys didn't seem to mind.  She stood in the raging flames without flinching.  Instead, she calmly reached up and grabbed at some not-quite-thing in the phoenix's head, around the bluish glow of its eyes.  "_Pure Ply._"  The strongest healing power Mercury could offer surged and swirled into the firebird, and a moment later Elys was standing in mere smoky air again, holding what might have been a torch.

                "I told you there was something strange about her," stated Lynn, flatly.  She was too busy being astonished to put any emotion into her voice.

                "You were in some trouble there, weren't you?" she asked the flames in her hand.  "Well, you haven't hurt anyone, so that's all right.  It'd be nice if you'd help out, though."

                "You're sure about this?" asked Padriac, sceptically.  He leaned out from behind a large stone wall that had once been part of some inventor's Colosso entry, but was now serving as a shield to keep the Venus Adept from being made one with his element.

                "Arr," said Hail.

                "That means yes?"

                "Means 'I'm inclined to agree that your statement is accurate'."

                "You _never_ told me you ever _spoke_ without a certain level of _piratical_ accent."

                "Aye.  Oh, an' me feelin's that Cian's called up Spring, so ye'll have twice the power."

                "All _right_, just get _on_ with it."  Padriac took a couple of deep breaths and edged out to see if the chimaera was waiting for him.  Its attention had been called away by something happening beyond the firewall, so he didn't waste the opportunity.

                "Arr, not good timing…" Hail murmured.  The chimaera glanced back and caught sight of Padriac just as he emerged from hiding.

                Not to be deterred at a time like this, Padriac shouted "_Water Power Rise!_"  The chimaera seemed startled at the cry, and sucked in air for a fireball.  The captain fought down an urge to point out how overly dramatic these words were, and dove ahead.  "_Padriac summons Nereid!_"

                All three mouths opened in a panic as the two Mercury Djinni fused their powers and the princess of the sea rode out of nothingness on the back of a great turtle.  Her fan snapped open, and she flourished it at the mixed-up beast like a deadly weapon.  In her hands, it was. 

                The chimaera released its blast at the last moment before water exploded from the ground underneath it, an unstoppable torrent that it could not withstand.  When the water turned to blue light and vanished into the sky, and the princess returned to whatever place she had come from, all that was left of it was a monster-shaped ashen statue, which Lynn blew apart with an arrow-guided Whirlwind.

                And Padriac lay scorched and battered on the stony wreckage, where he had landed after the chimaera's fireball caught him.

                "Oh no…" Cata moaned, seeing the captain's condition.

                "Do something!" Zak shouted, and slammed his hoof into the ground.  A Psynergy tremor ran through the earth and into the support of a damaged trial-device, which toppled and provided a bridge over the still-crackling firewall.

                Elys was the first to scramble over it, running to Padriac.  Psynergy was still in him, and so he wasn't gone yet.  She looked at the flames in her hand.  "You have to help me."

                "_Name… me…_" it wheezed, as though on the edge of death itself.

                Elys nodded gravely.  "_Unleash Tinder!_"

                The sputtering flames vanished completely, but in their place a much greater light was born, a mighty red that shone on the fallen Adept and rained phoenix feathers on him.  At their touch, his burns healed, bones mended, and skin sealed.  His breathing strengthened, and it was clear that the captain wasn't nearly dead yet.

                Elys turned to face the other Knights, and held up -no longer clutched, but standing proudly on her palm- a Mars Djinni.  "Got one of my own.  I'm good now."

                "Oh, is _that_ what this was all about?  Djealousy?" asked Tinder.

                Elys stared.  "Oh, great, mine has the worst sense of humour yet."

                Dagna marched into the burnt battlefield of the coliseum and surveyed the destruction.  "Well, a fine mess this lot is!  If ye've dealt with that goat-cat-birdy now, would yer like ter explain what in blazes are goin' on ter meself an' the rest o' the city?"


	12. Never A Dull Moment

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Twelve:  Never A Dull Moment**

                "It's really not such a big deal, is it?" asked Cata.  Squall, flapping calmly by her head, wasn't moved by this tactic any more than the last few.  "Come on, if you do it, it's got to be fate, doesn't it?  Because you did do it, so you were always _meant_ to do it.  Otherwise you'd be messing up destiny."

                "On the other foot," said Squall, who didn't have hands (or, for that matter, arms), "if I pretend all I can hear right now is a faint humming as of bright butterflies swirling about in the breeze, that's destiny too, because I was always meant to ignore you."

                "What's going on, Cata?  You look so serious," said Elys, coming up between them.

                "A discussion of fate.  There's not much else to do right now."  Cata glared at her Djinni.  "For a variety of reasons, many of which are contained within a nearby purple object."

                The Knights had been marching for days, leaving Tolbi far behind to start rebuilding the coliseum after the chimaera attack.  Jastyx and Dullahan had escaped cleanly during the chaos, probably after their summoned creature was obliterated by Padriac's strange summoned spirit.  He was ambling with deceptive speed at the back of the group, looking lost in thought but easily keeping up with the others.

                "Well, by now you've probably noticed that every time we meet someone with a Djinni, that person ends up joining us," Cata began.  All three of them looked back at the dwarfish inventor, Dagna, who was currently in the middle of a rant.  He was speaking to Howl, but it could as easily have been a rock for all the chances Dagna was giving the lycanthrope to speak.

                "This were te be me year!" Dagna was growling.  "I had the bes' invention, I were as clever as the rest o' the lot mixed t'gether, an' these two Adepts come along an' steal the prize afore I can win it, as I would ha'e?!  Nowt a bleedin' chance!  'Sides which, I can be plenty o' help, an' if it's help ye wan' fer blasting this Dullyhan inter the stars, this are precisely the dwarf ye're lookin' fer.  Got plen'y o' surprises in store fer that one, on me ancestor's souls.  Thinks he can get away wi' stealin' me rightful property, I'll show 'im a few pounds o' blastin' powder what ha'e a dif'rent point o' view!"

                "Yes," Elys agreed as the raging went on.  "I think that people across Angara are probably aware of that, now that we've got Dagna."

                "So obviously a person with a Djinni is fated to join us, right?" Cata went on.  "Right.  So if it's just a matter of who's got a Djinni and who doesn't, then I don't see what's wrong with Squall going ahead, finding Djinn, and getting them to the right people."

                "Do I want to know who the right people _are_?" asked Elys.

                "Cute boys, as near as I can tell," said Squall.

                "I did not say cute.  Nor boys," Cata insisted.  "And anyway, the people I was referring to would be precisely the ones who are supposed to join us.  It would be fate.  If you don't do anything, that'll go against the natural order of the universe."

                "What are you doing with my Djinni?" Meg demanded.

                "Zephyr refused to listen," Cata replied sullenly.

                "And Squall can't resist and argument," Meg finished, nodding her understanding.  "You haven't agreed to do anything, have you?"

                "Of course not," Squall answered.  "And if I hear the phrase 'dashing young men' again this century I may retch.  Are we near the next city yet?"

                "It's not exactly a city," Cian answered just behind them, and Cata twitched in startled annoyance, suspecting that he had been listening all along.  "Hesperia is sparsely–"

                "Heswhat?" Elys repeated, cutting him off.

                "When we crossed the river northwest of Tolbi, we left the continent of Angara and entered Hesperia, one of the lands on which Jupiter Lighthouse shines," the Lemurian explained.

                "And one of the most _boring_ foreign places you could _ever_ imagine," Padriac muttered.  "Nothing worth _seeing_, nothing worth drinking, _and_ the women are more likely to beat you _senseless_ than take a compliment."  The captain glanced around and then continued in a low voice.  "Also, not that I ever had anything to do with this sort of thing, there's not a blasted thing worth stealing for a thousand miles from the village."

                "Village?" Elys echoed.  "We're going to a village?  There's got to be a better place."

                "Hesperia's mostly wilderness," Cian explained.  "Rocks and trees, and trees and rocks, and rocks and trees, and trees and rocks–"  
                "We get it," Meg informed him, unsheathing her shorter sword in a meaningful way.

                "And water," the Lemurian added.  "Furthermore, I only call it a village because that's its name.  However, Shaman Village is as big as any city on Osenia or Gondowan, and exceptionally populous."

                "Do I want to know about the shamans?" asked Elys, falsely cheerful.  "For example, do they often curse people in creative ways involving plagues of locusts or lightning or vampire slugs?"

                Cian frowned.  "Elys, we've fought Grassils, Lemurian sentinels, Alhafran soldiers, giant yellow creatures with bat wings, healed a phoenix and slain a chimaera.  What could possibly be threatening about Jupiter Adepts and some sacred rites?"

                "What if their standard greeting for foreigners is to hurl blessed fruit?"

                "Let 'em!" Howl said fervently.  "I'm starving!"

                "This man are a great conversationalist," Dagna informed the rest of the Knights.  "Never've I known a man ter keep up with me when 'm on a roll about thermite reactions!  Did ye know tha' a shoddy thermite charge c'n spray molten iron fer thirty feet in all directions?  Used 'em once 'r twice on some o' those mad monsters what lair in the deep mines back in Loho, but ye'd not believe the stories 'bout accidents in the forge.  There are more'n one way to superheat a magnesium strip, say nae more."

                "By the way, as the person who's been listening to this for the past six miles, I feel you all owe me in vast amounts of whatever I decide to call in," Howl reminded them.  "To start with, Elys, I'd like it if you could make those really tender marinated steak strips like that first night out of Alhafra."

                "I don't see what your problem is," Fever remarked, still watching the slightly oblivious dwarf from his perch on Howl's shoulder.  "He's riveting."

                "I would, but we don't have the meat.  Strictly packed food from here to Shaman Village, and meat doesn't keep well," said Elys.  "Unless you've got side of beef in your pack."

                Howl blinked a few times and rubbed his grey-furred forehead with one paw, as though checking something.  "You know," he said after a while, "as much as I appreciate being treated like any other person, there are times when you really ought to take note of things like wolfish noses or fangs."  He inclined his head to sniff the breeze.  "Would a small deer serve?"

                "Serve for wha–" Elys began, but Howl was already gone, leaping off the faintly-beaten path and into the deeper vegetation, dropping to all fours and speeding out of sight, dislodging Fever as he went.

                "He'll be back," Meg stated lazily, contented as all predators in their homelands.

                "Ya-ha!" Fever shouted and darted after Howl.

                "…Probably," Meg added.

                Rish moved fluidly through the forest, not bothered at all by the rain, which tended to turn to steam before it touched her.  The corrupted trail of the Tomegathericon had led her a long way, and if she was fortunate, she was now catching up with the thieves.  Fools that they were, they'd either destroy themselves soon or they had sold themselves into another's service.  If the second was the case, Rish had no choice but to intercept the book first.

                "I do hope you realise what your problem is," said Flash.

                "Yesu," Rish replied tersely, wondering if it was worth trying to cross over a stream in the rain, or if she should simply walk through it.

                "Really?" the Djinni continued.  "And what's that?"

                "I have to deal with sarucastic Djinn wherever I go," she explained, and sprung to the far bank.

                "Hah, that's funny," Serac remarked flatly.  The Mercury Djinni was perched on her head, trying to see ahead through the woods, since water never obscured his vision.

                "Thato was sarucasm right there," Rish pointed out.

                "No, your problem is that you try to be subtle," Flash went on, ignoring Rish.  "Take those yellow creatures that we saved the girl from back outside Contigo.  Any normal person would have contacted the rest of the Yu Clan and started burning a trail through every obstacle in her path until she found the person who can actually create totally new kinds of monsters."

                "And the worud would be safe while the peroson who has been making demons knew thato they were being hunted, would it?" Rish asked, matching her Djinni's sarcasm.

                "'World', 'person', and 'that', Rish," said Serac.  "I admit your accent is getting better, but you've got to work harder or you're going to end up just seriously confusing people when you're trying to save their lives."

                "If these Knights keep up what they're doing," Flash commented, "then we might have a lot less saving to do.  You _did_ see the Coliseum in Tolbi, didn't you?  And hear the gossip?  They actually defeated a chimaera."

                "Gossip, Flash, the key word there is gossip.  It was probably just a big manticore," Serac said.

                "I don't buy it.  Manticores wouldn't wreak that kind of destruction that fast," Flash insisted.

                "Do I havu to spell-tag you both to geto some quiet?"

                Flash and Serac looked at each other, then Rish.  "Maybe you should just stay with Izuman and let us warn people about danger," Serac suggested.

                "Dagna, have I ever mentioned how often I've told Cata that we desperately needed a dwarvish inventor to join our group?" asked Elys.  "Every day.  Usually twice."

                "Aye, we're useful enough," Dagna agreed solemnly.  "Pass another strip o' deer ter show yer gratitude, would ye lass?"

                Elys leaned out of the opening in the large domed tent, a haven from the rain that Dagna had produced from his large pack and constructed within three minutes of the rain beginning to truly pelt down on the Knights.  Just beyond the tent's mouth, a small supported flap kept the fire from being doused by the rain and kept the roasting meat from being soaked.

                "Aside from the fact that you're lying, that's absolutely true," Cata agreed, ripping into her portion of meat with feral satisfaction.

                "I can't take all the credit for this, of course.  Cata made the sauce," Elys remarked nonchalantly.

                While Cata protested this revelation and Cian assured her that he wished he had known more heroes who could cook during his old adventures, Howl and Zak rested under a nearby tree.  Zak was there because he didn't fit into Dagna's tent, while Howl felt that it was impossible to eat properly in a small space.

                "_Hgarrrgh__!_" he growled, tearing the meat apart with his fangs.

                "Do you have to do that near me?" Zak asked, mildly disgusted.

                "How far away would be enough?" Howl asked, looking up.

                "Another world?" Zak suggested hopefully.

                "Can't help you there," the lycanthrope replied, and resumed his savagery.  Zak simply lay there and fumed, highly affronted by the entire scenario and wishing fervently that the rain would stop.  Hopefully Howl wouldn't get drenched; if Cata thought a wet dog smelled bad, she should trade noses with a horse for a day and then count her blessings when she switched back.

                At that moment, a scent drifted to Zak on the winds of irony.  He didn't recognise it, but certain things are burned into the instincts of herd animals, and immediately Zak's ears perked– there were predators nearby.

                Howl was busy with the food he and Fever had so fiercely sought out, and so didn't notice as the horse rose to his hooves and began creeping about the wide trunk, trying to determine which way the tumultuous winds had been blowing when he had caught the presence of danger.  Zak stopped, ears quivering.  Something was nearby, but he couldn't see any motion in the bushes except from large drops of rain, and the clear patches of grass were, naturally, totally clear and grassy.

                The creature fell on him from the branches above, landing on Zak's back and immediately drew a roughly-hewn blade from its wooden armor, with Zak's neck as its intended resting place.  Fortunately, Zak was smarter than a regular horse, and rather than panicking, he simply threw himself backwards, smashing the attacker between himself and a very large tree.

                "_Enemies!_" Zak shouted, trying to hurl the stunned foe off his back.

                Meg shot out of the tent in mid-air, stretched flat so that she could fit between the awning and the fire without bothering to deal with either, although the result was that she dove into muddy earth.  Rolling to her feet, Meg's swords seemed to spring to her hands, and just in time, for a figure armored in blackened wood with a pair of sickles was just about to try to harvest her.

                "Is there really anything out there?" Cata called from inside the tent, although she had already reluctantly allowed Cian to douse the fire.

                "_YES!_" Zak shrieked, as he had finally dismounted the creature only to discover that another three had emerged from the undergrowth.  They were short but human-sized, thickly muscled with wooden armor and plain masks, armed with a variety of stone weapons from simple daggers to wickedly curved sickles.

                Three foes was two more than a horse could be expected to handle on his own, and they were eyeing Zak in a hungry manner.  He vaguely wondered if they could be convinced that talking horses were inedible, but when they were approaching from all directions in approved hunting fashion, diplomacy rarely worked.  Zak summoned up deep-lying power and slammed a hoof to the ground.

                "_Punji__!_"  Spears of bamboo, a faint green glow the only hint of their Psynergetic origins, burst in concentric circles around Zak like a stabbing shockwave that did far more for prolonging his life than arguments were going to.  "_Gaia!_"  The ground exploded with Venus power, hurling one of the hunters away and spewing ballistic rocks in all directions.  Zak carefully watched the now-falling attacker, and was relieved to see it turn grey and disintegrate on impact.  "It's okay!  They're monsters!"

                Cata, who was currently picking her way through a punji-spear barricade to rescue her noble steed –yes, she really does think like that– stopped at that shout and stared baffled at Zak.  "That's a good thing?"

                "Yes," Cian agreed, his hands flaring blue as he brought them together.  "No mercy needed.  _Froth Sphere!_"  Even in the heavy rain, his barrage of exploding whirlpool-orbs were a force to be reckoned with.

                "Well… I'm still a little worried," Lynn admitted, brushing wet hair out of her face as she kept watch for further ambushes.  Far enough away not to hampered by Zak's bamboo strike, Meg and Howl were tearing a flaming trail through a half-dozen of the murderous beasts.  One dropped out of a tree and swept its sickle at the lycanthrope's unprotected back, and Lynn acted instantly.  "_Unleash Gale!_"

                The Djinni's windstream picked the creature up off its feet and hurled it back into the same tree's trunk, where a pair of arrows made sure it stayed put.  "Not that worried, it would seem," Cian remarked.

                "Not where friends are concerned, no," she agreed absentmindedly, peering through the rain for more friends.  "Where's Dagna?  And Padriac, for that matter?"

                If she hadn't been distracted by another pair of armored monsters at that moment, Lynn would have liked to know that the two brawler friends were currently chasing three more through the woods, hurling taunts, insults, and occasionally Psynergy blasts in their direction.

                "Ye be doin' this all the time?" Dagna asked cheerfully.  "Firs' that grand beastie in th' coliseum and the great flappin' fiery thing, an' now ye're findin' crazy hunter types in the middle o' a bleedin' tempest!"

                "_Fantastic_, isn't it?" Padriac called back through the roaring wind and rustling undergrowth.  "Reminds _me_ of the old days playing _cannon_ tag with the Alhafrans in the Osenian _inlets_!"

                "Jus' as wet?" Dagna suggested.

                "I _meant_ the tactics," Padriac replied, and now he was frowning slightly.  "That's interesting…  That's _very_–"

                The thick undergrowth, which was tall enough in some places to be on its way to overgrowth, suddenly gave way to clear air and a trip wire, which pitched Padriac down a steep slope with incredible speed and began a one-dwarf avalanche to his left.  They crashed to a halt at the dusty base – formerly dusty, now turned to mud by the still-raging storm.

                "_A dast-blangdin' trap?!_" Dagna roared, emerging from his half-sunken pose.  "Nae a bleedin' monster are goin' ter get awa' with settin' a flamin' trap fer Dagna o' Loho!"

                "If you've got an idea…" Padriac suggested, raising himself on his elbows.  The liquid earth had a hold on his entire body, and that included rather more surface area than densely-built Dagna.  Having pulled his head upright, Padriac saw the four monsters they had been chasing emerge from the foliage with murderous intent.

                "Aye, that I dae," Dagna replied, and hurled a strangely wheeled contraption from a side-pack into the mud.  All of them eyed it expectantly, even the confused beasts.

                "As _incredibly_ useful as diversions are, _couldn't_ you have found something more _intimidating_?" the pirate asked hopefully.

                "Ah…" Dagna said knowingly, although he was watching the no-longer-interested monsters warily, too.  "Mus' be an ignition problem.  Won' be a moment."  With that, the dwarf dove forward, reaching for the odd device, and slammed his fist on one part of it in a clinical, expert manner.  The wheel began to glow red and spin with impressive velocity, spraying ever-hotter mud at one of the approaching creatures.  In a few moments its front was coated in rapidly-cooling earth, and between the immense heat and the rain, Dagna had half-petrified two of them before the others had the sense to run.

                "That's a bloody merciless weapon," Padriac blurted.

                "Nah," said his Venus Djinni.  "That's inventive.  It's actually supposed to be a prototype boat driver.  _This_ is merciless."

                "_Unleash Geode!_" Dagna roared, and a glowing orb of earth power that mirrored the surrounding forest crashed down on both immobile monsters, smashing them into rapidly-vanishing grey dust.

                The captain and the dwarf had nearly recovered from their unexpected tumble and crash when several more people arrived, but fortunately for the two Knights, they really were people, if oddly dressed.  They didn't speak any language Padriac knew, and although Dagna had heard it before, he wasn't near fluent either.  The newcomers, who were dressed appropriately for the local heat and painted with substances that didn't wash off in the rain, searched the area thoroughly while a few of them stood guard on the Knights and tried to communicate.

                "Do I look like I speak Jabber?" Padriac demanded, rubbing his bruised arms sourly.  "Hail, can you make any sense of this?"

                "Arr, I be havin' a plan," Hail said sagely, and hopped onto Padriac's head.  "AVAST, ye hull-clingin' invertebrates, start makin' sense or I'll be loadin' ye inter the cannons, an' the cannons are about five hundred miles southeast o' here!"

                "My thanks, Hail," Padriac growled sarcastically.  "That'll be all, I think."

                ((_What in the name of Jupiter is that thing?_)) asked one of the Attekans.

                ((_I don't even want to know where it came from, just don't let it bite you,_)) he was advised.

                ((_Can it bite?  I don't think it has a mouth._))

                ((_Oh, the blue creature?__  That's a Mercury Djinni.  I meant the dwarf._))

                "Has it occurred to you," Zak asked pleasantly, wedged into what seemed to be the only safe space left, "that you've got a sword?"  Cata was in the middle of crawling over, around, through, and under the chaotic forest of spears that had been created by Zak's further Punji Psynergies, which had finished the battle neatly in one sense, and a bit messily in the sense that a faint greyness had settled over much of the surrounding earth, left over from the disintegrated monsters.

                The Jupiter Adept paused, partly straddling a spiky cluster of bamboo spears that had come up at strange angles due to a large and apparently un-puncturable rock.  "I knew that.  I was… uh…"

                "Save it, Cata," said Zak.  "Just get me out of here."

                "Hold on, I think I can do this," said Meg.  "Everyone duck, okay?"

                "_DOWN!_" Cian shouted, pulling Cata and Elys to the ground instantly, with Lynn just after him.  Howl decided that mud and fur was another combination worth avoiding, and dodged behind a tree.  Meg scowled at them all for a moment, but then put her mind to Psynergy.  If she could master it, she would be undefeatable, and every chance to practice counted.

                "_Fireball!_"  Repeated blasts of fiery wrath spread from her outstretched hand, shredding row after row of the punji spikes.  Meg smiled, seeing the powerful Psynergy held so easily under control, but she did have to try several times to _stop_ the flow of flaming orbs, and still got little response.  Growing frantic, Meg shoved her hand into a rain puddle and the charge of Psynergy dispersed (along with the puddle, which instantly became steam).

                "Good, very good, thank you Meg," Howl said, emerging from shelter with a protective death grip on his tail.  "Don't ever do that again, okay?"

                "I had it under control," she insisted.

                "Do I still have a mane?" asked Zak, who was as flat to the ground as a horse gets.

                "Yes," Elys assured him.

                "And the rest of my body?"

                "Still there," she continued, washing mud from her phoenix-engraved bracers.

                "So I'm not imagining the feeling that I've been sautéed?" he went on.

                Cata groaned.  "Lynn, anything you can do here?  If Zak's complaining all the way to this village, we're just going to call in more of these hunter creatures, and I'm not exactly feeling great either."

                "Easy," she assured them, and cleared her throat theatrically.  With a raised arm, she proclaimed "_Lyric!_" and a fountain of violet sparks exploded upwards, raining ghostly musical notes on the heroes.  A quarter-note bounced along the ground, remaining perfectly upright the whole time, before bursting against Cian in a rush of healing power.  Similar impacts were occurring to the other Knights, mending their injuries and soothing the burns from Meg's fire-sweep.

                "Psynergy with musical accompaniment?  That's a new one," Elys commented.  "And has anyone figured out where the other two got to?"

                Howl tilted his head back, resigned now to being thoroughly drenched, and smelled the humid air.  After a second's inhalation, he staggered and almost fell back against the tree again, but Meg caught him in time.  "_Whoa_ yeah, that's dwarf all right.  It's a good thing they don't have lycanthropes around here; that's the most distinctive smell since curried shrimp."

                "Just lead the way," said Cian, "before they get us into more trouble."

                "I hope werewolves dry out really fast," Zak grumbled, trotting through the forest at the back of the group.  "He can talk about dwarves all he likes, but I'm the one with a sensitivity to predators.  Not that anyone else cares."

                "We would care," Elys assured him as she finished folding up Dagna's tent and stuffing it back into a saddlebag.  She patted his flank again and ran to catch up with the others, with Zak following.

                "If?" Zak prompted– as a Jupiter Adept horse, he didn't need breath to speak.

                "We were prey," Elys replied shortly, as though it were obvious.

                "Ah.  Right."  Zak consider this, the mud, the tangling undergrowth, and the unflinching rain.  "Bloody humans."

                "I like these people," Padriac decided, reclining in a long, well-cushioned chair.  "I am positively infatuated with these people.  I have never encountered a more wonderful culture.  Another one, Dagna?"  The dwarf shook his head; he was still contentedly devouring some kind of dense local fruit.  "That'll be enough."  He waved the attendant away, successfully not noticing the growing glower on the man's face, and settled in to enjoy the drink they had supplied him with.

                Padriac and Dagna were inside a house at the edge of the village, now safely out of the rain, the cold, the monsters, and into a warm haven where a man with stripes painted onto his face showed them to comfortable chairs by a fire and supplied strong drinks.

                He realised precisely why life was going so smoothly when a white-robed woman with gravely serious blue eyes and laughably fluttery pink hair threw the door open and stepped in out of the rain (curiously dry, as well).  Complications in life happened because of females, and he had temporarily shaken them all off.  It seemed that luck was over.

                "You are the delegate."  Some of her statement's close relatives were probably questions, but this one wasn't.  And unfortunately she was looking directly at Padriac.  "Although I find your appearance to be of questionable consideration for someone speaking to the Shaman Council, I trust that your skill in debate will more than make up for it."  Finally noticing Padriac's blank stare, she added, "I am Lori.  You do speak Gondowanish, do you not?"

                "That's the _first_ actual question you asked," Padriac noted.  "_Most_ people start somewhere around '_who_ the devil are you' and _work_ from there."

                "I know who you are," Lori said, and tilted her head in confusion.  "You are the delegate from Shaman Village.  You could not be an outsider; everyone knows that trespassing on our hallowed earth is punishable by death."

                "So this time it's _Cian's_ fault instead of one of the girls," Padriac said knowingly, nodding.  "That's a refreshing change, but I think I'm still going to have to beat him into blue sludge."  Lori was growing ever more confused by this, and the pirate decided it was time to change the topic.  "Have you met Dagna?"

                "Your bodyguard, of course," Lori agreed, extending her hand to the dwarf.  "You have the thanks of all the women of our village for your diligence.  Our scouts saw you destroy two Slayers even after their ambush; a feat few of our own people could manage so effectively."

                "Slayers?  Are that what ye be callin' the pesky things?" asked Dagna, placing the fruit on a table, wiping his hand on his beard, and shaking hers heartily.

                Lori actually giggled, to Padriac astonishment.  "Indeed we do, noble dwarf."  Then his astonishment turned to minor horror when she spun back his way.  "When were you last briefed on matters in the issue and the potential violence?"

                _Have ye the slightest clue what ye are doin'?_ asked Hail.

                _Yes.  Not being executed_, Padriac replied.  "_As_ a matter of fact, _I'm_ not the one you want.  The _Slayers_ in fact separated me from the _rest_ of my party, and _they_ are the ones you'd be more interested in speaking to."

                Lori's eyebrows took on a complicated twisted angle that conveyed not just confusion, but the precisely level, pressure, and humidity of her confusion as well.  This woman's face was _expressive._  "There are more of you?  We only requested a single delegate."

                Pirates are quick thinkers.  "I _hardly_ think that anyone would _deny_ the importance of the _issue_ at hand," he said.  "My comrades are _also_ skilled warriors, I have _no_ doubt that they are _already_ approaching this village.  _Dagna_ can stay here and _rejuvenate_ himself, I had better go _meet_ them."

                "…As you wish," Lori decided eventually, though she still looked off-balance about the whole idea.  Padriac bowed low in the sailor's fashion, then stepped out into the weakening downpour and tried to not looked overly relieved about escaping her.

                "Aye, tha' went well," Hail commented.

                "We're still breathing," Padriac agreed.  "But Cata is _not_ going to be happy about this."


	13. Concerning Shapeople

**Knights of Alchemy**

**Chapter Thirteen: Concerning Shapeople**

                "You're mad," Cata stated.  She spoke without emotion, but that was mostly because she couldn't decide whether astonishment, fury, despair, or fervency of belief should get priority.  "You're absolutely mad," she added, for good measure.

                "Is it just me or is that statement getting overused?" asked Padriac.

                "Aye, we be hearin' it a lot," Hail agreed, thoughtfully.

                The rest of the Knights had followed Howl through the Hesperian jungle, and arrived at the village at nightfall.  Cian said –luckily not too loudly, for reasons that would become clear later– that it wasn't _the_ Shaman Village, but clearly was a settlement of the same people, complete with the same spiritual ritualism.  They found Padriac, standing like an exiled statue, at the edge of the village, and it was apparent that he had completely given up on the idea of 'dry' ever being a part of his life again.

                When Elys called out to the landlocked pirate, he had sprung to life again and demanded silence until they found a safe place, with only a warning to watch out for pink-haired women to add to their confusion.  Why it was necessary to sneak back into accommodations that the villagers had apparently set aside for them wasn't clear, but anything that could worry Padriac had to be serious.

                Inside the surprisingly warm and dry building, where Dagna had hunched into a coil against the wall beside the fire like a clockwork dwarf that had run down, Padriac explained what he knew of the situation, and what he had told Lori, which is where Cata's statement came in (several times).

                "We're supposed to be delegates from Shaman Village?" Cian repeated.

                "That was the feeling I got," the pirate agreed morosely.  "Something about issues and violence."

                "Seems like we're supposed to be solving some kind of dispute," Lynn remarked.  "That shouldn't be too hard, should it?  It'll be nice not to have to kill everything on the opposing side for once."

                "You're mad too," Cata went on, turning to Lynn.

                "She's got a point," Elys admitted.  "Lynn, how do we settle a dispute when we don't know what it _is_, let alone how many sides there are or who's done what or even what sort of laws they've got?"

                "Any chance you know those things?" Meg asked Cian, but the Lemurian just shrugged helplessly.  "Right.  I'm for heading back out into the jungle.  I prefer slaying Slayers to deceiving shamen."

                "Shamans, I think," said Zak.

                "Ridiculous," Meg insisted.  "One man, several men, one shaman, many shamen."

                "But then you'd have to call the females shawomen," Zak replied.

                "There's a problem with that?"

                "There's a _problem_ with leaving," Padriac interjected.  "They'll _hunt_ us down and kill us.  You _did_ catch the bit about '_no_ trespassing'?"

                "…You never said that they killed trespassers," Elys said.

                "Bring 'em on," Meg growled.  "We can take Slayers, we can sure as Prox take on some shamen."

                "I've run plenty of times before," Howl told them.  "Once more doesn't matter much to me."

                All of them, with the exception of the unconscious Dagna, looked at Cata.  She stiffened at the uniform motion- Cata knew perfectly well that she was the one most knight-like in the group, and that she had been the one to start the entire adventure, but until this moment, she had never really thought of herself as the leader.  They would stay or flee at her command.

                And she wasn't going to be reckless with their safety if they had given her their trust.  "We'll go.  In the storm, with Meg and Howl to guide us, we can get out of their reach–"

                "You've arrived!" Lori exclaimed, coming through the door with a bright smile.  "It's good to see that Shaman Village does care about our troubles… but by Jupiter, I would never have expected so many of you.  Or so varied a group," she commented, eyeing Howl, Dagna, and Cian in particular.

                "Agcck," Cian said –choked, really– extending his hand just a little too fast.

                Lori shook it with an acknowledging nod.  "I'm sorry, I don't speak ancient Lemurian.  …Were you visiting Shaman Village at the time of the envoy's leaving, and ask to travel with them, or is this a pilgrimage?"

                Cian coughed and tried speaking again.  "As a matter of fact, I work with Dagna.  And Meg, that's her there.  Also, don't concern yourself overmuch, not many people on Lemuria know the old tongue fluently, and I would be amazed if you did."

                Meg imperceptibly raised an eyebrow– not so much at the lie as at the fractional hesitation before he had managed to say 'tongue'.  "Since our delegate companions have refused to say much about their mission while we escorted them from Shaman Village, perhaps you would be more enlightening?  I'd like to know what happens now that my part of the job is done."

                "The debate is scheduled for tomorrow," Lori answered.  "Even I'm not sure what sort of format it will be, but of course you will be presenting our case to the Shaman Council, and a few fossilized fools will be trying to argue that we're breaking ancient laws.  Jorl is the only one I'm worried about; he's young enough to put together a rebuttal that would sound good and right, even if it were pure evil."

                "And… what sort of arguments do you think they'll be using?" asked Cata, innocently enough.

                The Hesperian woman turned away.  "Everything they can get their hands on, of course," said Lori, glaring at the fireplace as though it offended her.  "Saying that it's tradition.  Saying that we're not capable of it.  Saying that it's not our place, as though being male somehow gives one extra powers or insights into the ways of shamanism."  She spun back on Cata, sapphire fire in her eyes.  "But you believe in us.  Shaman Village sent a delegation, so we must have support in other places.  The women of Hesperia will rise to the place we deserve."

                Cata couldn't help seeing in those eyes the fierce spirit that drove Lori, and suddenly the cryptic words made sense.  "Yes," the knight agreed.  "And we'll help you."

                It was almost midnight.  Lori had left the house, informing them that a messenger would be sent in the morning to alert them of the gathering council.  The Knights were still awake, except for Zak, who was in a warm stable beside the house, counting the number of ways it was better to be a horse than human, or at least humanoid.

                "That's the problem," Cata said.  "The reason that they've called for people from Shaman Village.  The laws say that women can't become shamans, and someone's finally realised that it's a stupid law."

                "Why do they need people from somewhere else?  Can't this be handled by local people?" asked Elys.

                "Ah!" Cian exclaimed, pointing at Elys.  "That's one I _do_ know.  Any modifications of law in the Hesperian cultures have very specific, ritualistic procedures to follow.  For one thing, the decision is made by a council of elder shamans, and one council is as good as any other, so it's always done in the village where the question first came up.  The 'capital', Shaman Village, still has some control, though, because they send a delegation to whatever village is hosting the debate and they get to pick the side they'll argue for–"

                "Okay, Cian, we're all bored now," Meg said, cutting him off.  She grinned, just slightly.  "Still, it's good to know you're not permanently… _tongue_-tied."

                "What's that supposed to mean?" the Lemurian demanded.

                "Just noticing your reaction to Lori is all," Meg replied innocently.

                Cian looked around the circle of Knights, and realised that of the five males in their band, only two were really human, and Padriac was, to be fair, a 'good' pirate.  "She's an elf, if you must know."

                "What?  There's no such thing as an elf, they're mythical," said Howl.

                "Do you ever, you know, think before saying stuff like that?" asked Meg conversationally.

                "What's your point?" asked the man who was a fusion of wolf and Adept.

                "The right word isn't 'elf', I admit," said Cian.  "That's just what Lemurians –among other people– have always called them.  People who have faery blood in their ancestry."

                "Faery blood," Elys repeated.  "Those weird creatures that live in the jungles around Kibombo?"

                "They live here, too, and some of them are even civilized enough that… ah…"

                "Humans fall in love with them?" Cata suggested.

                "Yes.  So there are half-faeries, or less, or sometimes more than half.  Elves."

                "And she is one.  I guess it was a bit much to hope," Howl admitted, staring into the fire with a brooding furrow in his furred brow.  Most of the other Knights looked at him expectantly.  "Well.. I did see her pointy ears."

                Cata tried very, very hard not to laugh, and mostly succeeded.  "You thought…?"

                "Hey, lycanthropes come in all shapes, sizes, and colours," Howl informed her stiffly.

                "Maybe before the full moon," Padriac agreed.

                "Ach," rumbled a voice like a dry-throated avalanche, and Dagna tilted his head up from his chin enough to see Howl.  "Bin meanin' ter ask ye 'bout tha', Howl.  How come ye're all wolfie whole month long?"

                "I'm a Venus Adept," Howl replied, since werewolves consider few sorts of questions personal.  "Lycanthropes are supposed to be aligned with Jupiter, so it beats me how I can even exist, but apparently earth power ties knots in the works, so I'm transformed all the time."

                "Grea'," Dagna murmured.  "Prob'ly put ye on yon debate team, then.  Other twerps'll be scared silent."  He said this with such an air of tired finality that the entire conversation ended, and the Knights drifted into whatever places in the building they found most comfortable.  This was easiest for Howl and Meg, who enjoyed the hard floor and stone near the fire, and by luck there were enough beds for the others.

                When morning came, the sky was a dull grey, but the city was well lit by sunlight radiating through the thin cloud blanket.  A surprising number of the Knights were already awake when Lori's messenger arrived, a youth who Cata thought looked suitably impressed to meet a band of powerful adventurers– even if he did think they were delegates from Shaman Village.

                "Their Excellencies the Elders of Attephes request the presence of Your Excellencies the Delegates from Shaman Village at the Council Hall in one hour's time," he said,  and although the boy's eyes kept leaping from the sword that Cata insisted on leaving strapped to her belt to Padriac's menacing Lemurianish features, or Howl (who needs no explanation) and back again, his voice was calm and sure.

                "Excellent," said Cata, who bowed –as she had read was proper for a knight, including women– and closed the door after thanking him for the information.  "Right.  No problem, is it?"

                "I thought you said _I_ was mad," Padriac groaned.  In theory, he had been awake for some time, having never got used to the lack of motion when sleeping on dry land, but until Cian found a way to make coffee strong enough for pirate captains, he refused to do anything but lie on the leather sofa (a luxury in the extreme) with one arm protecting his eyes from the light.

                "Yes, but you didn't know what you were getting into, and I do," Cata countered.

                "I don't like the idea of letting Jastyx and Dullahan get any further ahead," Cian stated, "but I left my decision up to you.  And I've got to admit that this is a worthwhile cause."

                "Right," Spring agreed cheerfully.  "So, as long as the world doesn't get covered in a new darkness that will destroy all life and give rise to an army of the undead or something, let's argue with some small-minded shamans.  I'm sure there'll be time to rescue Weyard later.  I certainly wouldn't say that you've _got some sort of problem with your priorities!_"

                "No wonder things seemed so peaceful.  The Djinn were keeping quiet," Meg realised.

                "Want me to exercise some control over them?" asked Tinder. 

                Elys turned to her Mars Djinni in surprise.  "You can do that?  What kind of power to do you _have_?"

                "Watch," said Tinder, and her blue eyes flickered, the only outward sign of a Psynergy call to the others.  All the Djinn became visible, even Coal poked his head through a window, through which they could see Zak trying out the local grasses.  Tinder cleared her throat, and not having one didn't seem to stall her in the least.  "_When they want your opinions they'll give them to you so get back inside and keep quiet unless you've got something useful to add!_"

                "Oh.  That power," said Elys.

                "I _think_ we've tried that _before_," Padriac murmured.

                "You know, from some unknown region I got the idea that you were a peaceful sort of Djinni," Elys remarked.  Tinder looked at her in surprise and slight confusion.

                "You want lighter?"

                "That would be a start."

                "Oh.  Hey, guys, lay off a bit.  They're doing the right thing as far as anyone can say for sure," Tinder announced to the Djinn, as though her first tirade had been a test run.

                If they had known better what kind of person Lori was, the Knights might have been more wary of their current situation, but they didn't, so when she combined the act of knocking and throwing the door open into a single smooth motion, they simply stood frozen to the spot.

                "Excuse me, I heard shouting and wanted to make sure oh sweet Jupiter preserve me _DJINN!_"

                "You see any point in vanishing?" Geode asked.

                "Nope," Squall replied.

                "We could pretend to be hallucinations," Fever suggested.

                "Or stuffed animals," Zephyr added.

                "Dwarves don't have stuffed animals," Geode pointed out.

                "What do the kids take to bed?" asked Spring.

                "Ore samples," the Venus Djinni replied.

                "Yes, those are definitely Djinn," Lori said mildly, her eyebrows raised but eyes looking vague, in the tone of one who has seen this all before and is less than astonished with the process.  She brightened and turned to Cata.  "Still, this is wonderful.  Only two council members even have Djinn –one of them rather wouldn't but it's better than giving up the extra status afforded– and this will raise our side even further in their eyes."

                "What kind of maniac would rather not have a Djinni?" asked Padriac, who had finally risen from the sofa, poured two cups of coffee for Cian and Lynn, and was now drinking the remainder of the kettle.

                "Arr, ye be makin' an excellent point.  We'd best be sure we're getting' a fair trial, an' crazy elders make th' whole thing more of a gamble than any pirate'd be wantin'."

                "Hail, we're not _on_ trial," Lynn said.  "It's just a debate to get rights for" –here she grinned at Meg– "shawomen on Hesperia."

                Hail frowned.  "…They'll still be hangin' us if we be losin', right?"

                "_No_," said Lynn, Padriac, Elys, and Howl in unison.

                "The landlubberin' cowards!  Where d'they think they get the–"

                "My apologies," said Padriac, shoving Hail inside a Riot Glove and stuffing it into his belt.  "She's insane is all."

                "Sometimes I think everyone is," said Lori, and smiled in such as way as to make Cian stagger the next time he tried to take a step.  "If I may lead our honoured delegates to the Council Hall?"

                The face of a great clock adorn most of the south-facing wall of the Council Hall, carved from more than a dozen different species of tree, and by its polished hands the Knights saw that it was only ten o' clock (not that Meg had any idea what that meant).  Lori explained that the debates sometimes went on for days, but if possible the elders would want to deal with it before nightfall.

                "I don't think they're going to want you in there," Cata said quietly to Zak, taking cover by letting Cian ask Lori about the giant clock.  "They don't know you can talk, either, so let's just leave it that way.  Hang around for a while if you want to, but go back to the stable before dark."

                "Yes _mother_," Zak hissed, though he spoke by careful manipulation of Psynergy, and so didn't appear to do anything except crop the nearest tuft of grass.

                "And don't take that tone with me, you little colt," Cata added, patting his back.

                "One of my _legs_ has as much mass as you," Zak muttered to himself as she moved on.  "I wonder if they'd mind if I played some tricks on the local guards…  Better not risk it with Jupiter Adepts, though…"

                The grin on Lori's face was smug enough to deflect arrows by the time she had led the remaining Knights through the massive corridor that might have been understated as a vestibule and into the wide, domed chamber where the elders waited.  Rows upon rows of seats filled half the semicircle for several levels up, reminding most of the Knights uncomfortably of the coliseum in Tolbi (except for Elys, who had felt like she was in another dimension for much of the battle).

                "At least we don't have an audience," Meg murmured, and was less than pleased to hear her own voice echoing around the dome.  The other half of the room, however, had a dais on the left and right side, with several chairs around a large table and a podium to speak on.  Those podiums faced the far wall, where nine roughly-aged men sat in imposing chairs, clothed in severe and ceremonial robes, armed with glares to silence any but the boldest of speakers.

                "That's the council, of course," said Lori to Cata.  "You can trust them– even if they don't agree with a position, the elders are under vows of faith to support the side that makes the better argument."

                "How do you know?" asked Cata, very quietly, and Lori's expression made it clear that she didn't believe she could possibly have properly heard the question (to the Hesperians, it was worse than insulting any of ancestors), so none of the Knights questioned the elders' honor again.

                "Venerable Shamans of Attephes!" Lori called out, acknowledging the village's council.  "I have the honor of heralding the delegation from Shaman Village, who will be representing our people in the matter to be discussed in this place and on this day."

                "We don't have to talk like that, do we?" asked Elys.

                "Only to the elders," Lori replied, bowing low, and the Knights caught on quickly enough to follow her lead.

                "I am pleased to know that we are now fully prepared to dispense with the issue," said one of the nine, and waved his left hand in a vaguely irritable manner.  A purple Whirlwind started up in the middle of the room, between the Knights and the elders, and rose vertically into the air until it reached a heavy bell at the apex of the dome.  The elder's Whirlwind sent it into a frenzy, ringing six times in quick succession before freezing perfectly still again.

                Doors were thrown open around the room, and what must have been the entire village streamed into the chamber, filling the same seats that Meg had previously been so grateful to see empty.  She was fortunately shocked into silence by the arrival of the council's thousand closest friends, and couldn't find the breath to curse all shamans.

                "Good turnout," remarked the youngest of the men seated on the left-hand dais, the ones who were going to be arguing against the Knights.  The smirk on his face was enough to make Cata despise him instantly, but she held back, in the knowledge that he would soon probably be providing even better reasons.  "I suppose the only reason that you would have agreed to this sort of issue is that you're the kind of person who believes there's glory in failing spectacularly?"

                Every Knight (even Dagna, who was hard to see in the crowd) and Lori glared at him, but Jorl –as Lori told them this particular fool was called– just amplified the obviousness of his smirk and turned back to the pages of notes they had brought.

                "Respected council," asked Cian with a half-bow, "are there particular places our Djinn should be taking during the debate?"

                The entire room fell silent, except for the elders, who began leaning over to each other and trading frantically murmured comments.  "They've got _what_?"  "More than one, unless he doesn't know the right plural form."  "Is there even policy for this?"  "By Jupiter, Shaman Village must be _serious_."

                "Around the sides, I think," Cian ordered them calmly, and the Knights' nine Djinn took physical shape in a squarish circle around their Adepts.  The crowd gasped loud enough to deafen passers-by.

                "Ye Spirits," Jorl blurted, but then his face and resolve hardened.  "This is the best you've got for us?  Showing off a collection of elementals is supposed to bolster your argument?"

                "To tell the truth," said the most senior councillor, "so many Djinn does suggest that the Spirits themselves might side with…"

                "Audacious ones," said Cata, hoping that she wouldn't be hung for cutting him off, "we will win this debate by merit of words, not the power or significance of our allies."

                "Significance!" Jorl exclaimed, waving frantically at the Djinn.  "Do we recognise the dominion of Mars on Hesperia?  Mercury?  _Venus?_"

                "I take offence at that," Geode mumbled.

                "Venus is as significant a part of Alchemy as Jupiter, even if it is not our way to worship it as we do the winds," said a councillor mildly, and with a start the Knights saw that he had a Venus Djinni sitting on his shoulder.

                Jorl opened his mouth to speak again.  "Excuse me," said the senior elder, smiling without malice, "but if I may be so _audacious_, may I suggest that you even your numbers before we officially begin the bloodbath– I mean… debate?"

                "Yes, get on with it," said one of the older men seated near Jorl, who seemed to be busy with a page of notes.  "We're ready any time."

                The Knights collectively paused, then spun to face inwards.  The crowd began to murmur among themselves about the bizarre group that had arrived from Shaman Village, brimming with Djinn and seemingly unaware of a single protocol.

                Elys  was glaring at the others as they did their best to point out how much better everyone else would be in arguments, and while she could see the point with Dagna and Howl, it was aggravating with the others.  "Oh, enough already.  They want three?  Here, _me_," she said, grabbed Lynn, "_you_," nodded at Meg, "and _you_."  The other Knights reluctantly took seats at the lowest level, separated from the three advocates by an ancient wooden railing.

                "Me?" Lynn hissed as she allowed herself to be dragged toward the podium.  "Why me?"

                "You're persuasive," Elys replied.

                "I am?"

                "Aren't you?"

                "Just don't call them 'audacious' again," Meg suggested.

                "That was Cata!" Lynn and Elys protested.

                "Whatever.  I'm not doing any arguing here, I'm just going to stand here and look imposing, maybe try to break their concentration.  The actual arguing is left to you, got it?"

                "Got it," said Lynn.  "I'll take the moral views, you try to break up any of their legal arguments."

                "Just as long as you know I'm not doing the arguing thing," said Meg again.

                "How can I do that if I don't know the laws?" Lynn demanded of Elys.

                "Say whatever sounds good and hope no one looks them up?"

                "I'm supposed to be really good with this sort of thing," she reminded the Mercury Adept fiercely, having had the sense to keep in mind that they Knights were supposedly delegates from the capital.

                "Great," said Elys, and Lynn knew instantly that she had been misinterpreted.

                The senior elder, who was now sporting a Jupiter Djinni on the arm of his chair, cleared his throat, and the girls looked up, slightly startled.  Meg sighed and unbuckled her sword belt with one hand (the other was busy shielding her eyes so that she didn't have to watch the proceedings in all their agonising glory).  He looked from Jorl's side and back again, eyebrows raised expectantly and said "Let it begin."

                "Venerable ones, the allowance of females to enter shamanhood is absolutely unthinkable," Jorl began instantly, like a leaping spider.  "The issue–"

                "Unthinkable?" Meg repeated.  "Welcome to the world, Jorl, people are thinking it.  And if _you_ think that your own position is endangered by women becoming shamans then by Mars you're right if the best opening you can come up with is to say that no one's thought about it, because anyone with a working head will realise that your establishment has always been upheld by women, even if they weren't wearing the robes.  I assume all of those gathered here today, with the exception of that thing over there called Jorl, had mothers?  Wives?  Can anyone say that even their friends have no influence on the kind of person they are?  Forget even that a world of men would end with the first generation and ask yourself just how often your choices are altered at all by the _other_ half of the population?"

                When Meg was done not-arguing, Lynn was fully ready to agree that Jorl probably didn't have a mother, as anything human would have the decency to be stunned beyond words for a least a few moments.  Instead he weathered the storm and immediately fired back.

                "I didn't mention the world, I was referring to the cities of Hesperia, united under Jupiter's faith– a faith, I add, that contains within its precepts many references to men attaining the rank of shaman, and makes no mention of women within our holy order."

                "Maybe Jupiter assumed you'd be bright enough to make the connection on your own?" Meg suggested scathingly.

                "My point is that if women were meant to enter our ranks then the title granted would not be _shaman_," Jorl countered.  To Elys' horror that silenced Meg, who had been asking the other Knights about precisely the same point less than an hour ago and still didn't have an answer.

                Elys leapt up and offered Meg her seat, saying "I'll handle this one," in what she hoped was a confident manner that didn't look at all like Elys was dragging a stunned huntress out of the argument before she could take another hit.

                "You have an answer to my question?" Jorl asked, smirking again.  Meg instinctively reached for her swords, but they and their belt were currently in Cian's hands, fifteen feet away.

                "I do," said Elys, and praised Mercury that she thought of one at that second.  "I think the reason the title is 'shaman' is that you're all men."  This failed to get any reaction at all, but that was better than being immediately thrown in her face.

                "…I'm not sure I see your point," Jorl said.

                "It's simple.  If there were women in the order, then maybe you would have a different title for them.  But you don't, so you don't," Elys said, shrugging.

                Jorl and his comrades were looking at each other dubiously, and Elys saw one of them mouth the words 'Did she actually make a point, or just look like she did?'

                "The point is entirely moot, then," the oldest man on Jorl's side stated loudly.  "The remaining fact is that women are infirm for the purposes of shamanic rites."

                "What, do we lack the ability to bluster properly?" Meg snapped, having sunk into one of the chairs, offended.  "Or is it the clear thinking that you're talking about?" She tilted her head back to see Lori over her shoulder.  "I always knew that would get us into trouble.  We need to be more muddled."

                "Shamans are frequently tested under terrible circumstances.  We are the line between destruction of our continent and protection from the most fearsome storms and monsters.  Shamans are the difference between salvation and doom for us all–"

                "And for some reason you'd rather have us at your back than your side?" Meg remarked.  "I admit I'm excellent at protecting someone while they're busy with other matters, but I'd be best placed at the front of any struggle."

                "_That_ is not my choice or concern," Jorl replied.  "You cannot challenge the nature of shamanhood, and part of that nature is–"

                "Excuse me," said Lynn, raising her hand with a crackling purple spark on one fingertip, guaranteed to attract attention.  "Are we going to get around to Jupiter being female soon?  It's just that you keep coming back to shamanhood being fundamental, and it seems that Jupiter herself is even more fundame–"

                "_What_?" snapped both the older shamans on the opposing side, while Jorl muttered some long stream of unheard words, scowling at Lynn the whole time.

                "It's true," Lynn said mildly, without gloating but clearly enjoying the effect her words had.  "You know, Jupiter?  The spirit of wind and lightning, the matron of possibility?"

                "_Matron_?" one sputtered, still beyond most words, but the other (who had been letting Jorl speak so far, but was now shouldering in front of the younger shaman) was more articulate.

                "Are you trying to tell me that the great Jupiter, commander of the winds–"

                "I don't like to keep cutting you off, but I think you should also keep in mind that Jupiter doesn't command the winds," Lynn pointed out.

                "_Blasphemy!_" he roared, recoiling from her, and Lynn's face instantly transformed into an unimpressed, irritated, and slightly curious scowl.

                "Jupiter _is_ the wind, you narrow-minded, cantankerous…"  The Attekan girl took a deep breath and continued with less anger but equal intensity.  "Jupiter is the wind rushing across the plains and hanging in the deepest jungles, the flash and thunder rolling across the sky and the subtle dance inside our heads that creates thought, the living lightning that raises us and all thinking beings above the mindless beasts called monsters.  Jupiter commands nothing.  She _is_, and she does."  Lyn turned and raised her eyes to sweep across every person in the dark, domed chamber.  "As should we all."

                "Show me proof," the shaman demanded.

                "Prove me wrong," Lynn countered.  "I am a Jupiter Adept, and not a weak one.  Jupiter lives in my every thought, every breath, and for myself I need no more proof than what I know."

                The shaman, thought he still stood firm and unwavering, could say nothing, and worked his mouth silently for a short time before turning and calling on Jorl, who was leafing through the many pages heaped on their table.

                "I'm looking, but there's nothing old enough for precedent," Jorl said apologetically.  "Every reference to Jupiter as male has either been translated through so many dialects that it could be talking about sticky rice recipes, for all we know.  The articles defining shamanhood are still very definite, but we can't actually prove her wrong with documents."

                "We're still sure Attephes is on the border between Atteka and Hesperia, aren't we?  And that Psynergy exists?" the shaman went on, gushing sarcasm.

                "Enough!" proclaimed the leading councillor.  "If there are no more major arguments to be brought forth, I believe the remaining details either side may have prepared are either already known to the elders of this hall…" and here he frowned at both sides briefly "…or irrelevant to the situation.  Thus, excepting protests, we will adjourn to deliberate the resolution of this issue."

                The elders stood (prompting the same from the rest of the room) and began to file into a room in the back of the hall, moving solemnly and silently while their two Djinn commented on the debate.

                "Took them to the cleaners, didn't they?"

                "Don't be a fool, Waft, it's nothing like definite."

                "Crystal, I realise that as Bane's sister you're less sane than some Djinn–"

                "I'm not his sister any more than you're his nephew, and you're missing the point, this is _protocol_ we're discussing, not some silly little rule invented last week."

                "Why did you think I said it was definite?  That argument's going to break protocol?"

                "…It sounded like you were favouring the delegates."

                "I sound like I say a lot of things."

                "Waft, you were just covering your feathery tail!"

                "And doing it with style."

                As though hypnotized by the bizarre dialogue following the elders out of the room, the Knights watched in a daze until the councillors were gone.  Jorl took no notice, shuffling all the notes he had made on the official writings into a single pile.  After a moment's contemplation, he gave a laughing shrug and hurled them all over his shoulder into the remaker's bin to be shredded and turned into new parchment, then approached the Knights.

                "Good work," the shaman said, extending his hand to Lynn, Meg, and Elys in turn.  "It was good of you not to challenge me to single combat to prove your worth."

                "You wouldn't have liked being filleted, would you?" asked Meg acidly.

                "No, I wouldn't," Jorl agreed.  "It also would have shown narrow-mindedness on your part, as though physical prowess mattered.  Still, you could have brought up Jupiter him- or herself a bit sooner.  You left me far too much free time to talk about the original doctrines."

                "What?" Elys demanded flatly.

                "Well, you left it long enough that there's some chance now the patro-shamanic side could win," Jorl explained.  "That'd be depressing after all this time; as you know appeals aren't allowed–"

                "No," said Lori, coming up behind him.  "They don't.  They're not from Shaman Village."

                Elys whirled around to see if anyone had heard, but the villagers watching from above were all too busy discussing the debate or other local gossip to take notice.  "Lori…"

                "Just don't mention it to anyone," she added, and Jorl nodded solemnly.  Then, to all the Knights' surprise, they both smiled and shared a firm hug that went slightly beyond friendly.  "Now," Lori went on, looking Jorl in the face with a mixture of severity and playfulness, "thorough work and all, there, but if you're not careful I'm going to get the idea that you believed even a word of what you said."

                "Not a chance," Jorl insisted, raising his hands in a pose of innocence.  "But when the elders call…"

                "I know," Lori said, giving him a playful half-punch, "you've got to hearken to the call of duty.  Do you fetch, too?"

                "Wait," said Lynn, holding up a quieting finger to both Lori and Jorl.

                "Wait wait wait wait wait," Elys agreed.

                "You mean to say that you didn't actually believe any of what you said?" Meg demanded.

                The shaman shrugged, embarrassed.  "I was commanded to do it.  Lori and I weren't quite ready to go revolutionary on the elders yet."

                "You're mad," said Cata, who was leaning over the railing and listening in.

                "I want to know how you know where we didn't come from," said Elys, frowning at Lori.

                "They _can't_ be back already!" exclaimed a villager, calling attention to the door the elders had left through, which had just swung open again.

                "Apparently they can," said Lori in a concerned tone, and she let go of Jorl.

                "Jupiter be with us," Lynn murmured, taking her seat to wait for the proclamation.


End file.
